


Big Black Car

by gats24



Category: Motherland: Fort Salem (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Military, F/F, Military/Mercenary AU, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-03
Updated: 2020-12-19
Packaged: 2021-03-04 23:40:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 15
Words: 92,955
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25044772
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gats24/pseuds/gats24
Summary: Raelle Collar is a trauma surgeon serving in the US army alongside her two best friends, Abigail Bellweather and Tally Craven. Scylla Ramshorn is an intelligence officer for an independent military contract group, Spree Security.“I hear the mushrooms are to die for,” she rasped in the blonde’s ear when she was next to her.The blonde startled at first, then recovered quickly, “Ah, Scylla. If it isn’t my least favorite mercenary.”“Not a mercenary,” the practiced correction fell from her lips before she fully processed. “Wait a second, least favorite?”Military/Mercenary AU
Relationships: Raelle Collar/Scylla Ramshorn
Comments: 245
Kudos: 783





	1. Before the dark

Chapter 1

Before the dark, it was light, almost blindingly so. She remembered lifting her hand up to try to shield her eyes from the source. An action that was entirely useless in the end. It was the last thing she remembered before it was all dark. From there on, it came in separate and discrete prepackaged pieces. It was as though her other senses began to compile all the details as her eyes remained shut.

She could hear running water running, a broken pipe probably. Her mind placed the sound somewhere behind her. It wasn’t close enough that any of the water seemed to be reaching her. There was the sound of something shifting nearby. With it, she felt the earth shake and rumble around her. She tasted metal and dirt and something else she couldn’t put her finger on.

The smell was the worst of it. Even years later, it was what kept her up most nights. It bothered her more than it should because she had always liked bonfires growing up. It was something they did often back home. On cold winter nights and fall evenings, she would roast marshmallows with her dad and listen happily as he told stories larger than the town itself. He would paint ghost stories, tell her epic romances, and stories of heroes who always seemed to have a familiar shade of blonde hair. He would do voices and bad Russian accents that made her giggle. She would sloppily eat smore after smore before going to bed with sticky hands and a full heart. When she’d wake up the next morning, her bed would still smell of the bonfire from the night before and she’d spend the first five minutes basking in it.

She doubted she would ever be able to roast a marshmallow again because the smell of her memories, haunted in that of burning flesh and a night she would gladly forget if her mind would let her.

She hadn’t felt much of anything at first. It was like she had been sleeping and slowly becoming aware of every part of her body again. Then, with only the slightest movement, she began to feel everything at once. Everything was encompassed in pain. Fresh, white hot pain that didn’t quite have a start and certainly didn’t seem to have any end. She groaned and felt her chest ache.

She cleared her throat, noticing how dry her mouth was. She swallowed hard before trying, “hello?”

The word came out muffled, as if she were shouting through a pillow but it somehow still echoed around her.

_Where am I?_

She tried opening her eyes. Seeing only black, she blinked heavy once, twice. Only shadows in front of her. There was a light blinking in the upper right corner of her vision. On and off, it blinked, swaying slightly. Each blink offered a glance at the unfamiliar scene around her. There was debris of some kind stacked on either side of her, a turned over table with its legs facing her just out of reach. She felt cold air floating over her face.

_Was that the wind?_

She began to take inventory. She was on the ground, laying on her stomach. Her left arm was twisted in an unfamiliar position. Her right arm lay at her side not comfortably, but not uncomfortably either. She cautiously wiggled her fingers on her right hand and breathed a sigh of relief when the pain she was feeling everywhere didn’t intensify with the movement. She then rotated her hand at the wrist then elbow in the same pattern, testing carefully as she went.

Something dripped into her left eye and sent a thin, cloudy veil over her vision. She tried to blink it away. It left her eye feeling dry despite being some kind of liquid. With effort, she lifted her head fully off the ground for the first time. As she did, she felt the muscles in her neck ache in protest. She found herself looking at the night sky.

_I shouldn’t be seeing night sky._

A voice in her head told her and she wasn’t sure exactly what it meant.

Whatever had dripped became more of a steady trickle at the change in position. She blinked rapidly before closing her eye and keeping it shut. She felt the liquid move over her closed eyelid, onto her cheek and drip off her chin.

_Maybe water from that pipe?_

But that couldn’t have been right. The water sounded farther away.

She let out a breath, steeling herself before the movement she knew she needed to make. At the end of the breath she counted to three in her head. Lifting her right hand from its place at her side to move it in front of her. She hardly lifted it off the ground before she felt a sharp pull from her right side, so sharp her vision blacked out momentarily. Her heart beat faster in protest and her breathing increased, but she had done it.

There in front of her was her right hand. She kept her left eye closed and inspected it with her right. It was gloved, she noted, inspecting it in the light of night sky and the flashes of light. It was pulled over a surgical gown’s white cuff. A blue surgical gown sleeve was torn in an irregular pattern from wrist down to the elbow. She saw her own skin peeking back at her as she rotated the arm slowly.

_Glove, gown…_

She brought the hand to her face finding part of it covered by a surgical mask. She pulled at it, tearing it from its ties and straining with the effort.

_Goddess, you really gotta start hitting the gym. Getting too soft as a doctor now. Can’t even rip off a mask, shitbird?_

A ghost of a smile crossed her lips as the words rung in Bellweather’s voice instead of her own.

_Glove, gown, mask…_

She reached up higher feeling the outlines of her lucky scrub cap with Collar raised on a tag on the front. It was one of the last real items she had from her mom. Her mom had completed countless operations and made it back from a number of tours unscathed and she had always said it was because of this cap. It was a faded blue from years of washing with a pattern of small, bowerbirds adorning it. Lucky birds, she had told a sobbing six-year-old Raelle at yet another military sendoff with a conspiratorial wink at the end. They were the kind of birds that loved blue just like the shade of her eyes. They would never let her stay away too long from Raelle and her dad’s blue eyes. Raelle had worn the cap with pride in her first surgery and so many since then.

 _Glove, gown, mask, cap._ She paused at the list, repeating it once more before the fog over her brain lifted lightly. _I’m in the OR._

She waited for the rest of it to come back to her, an explanation of how and why she had ended up here and when it didn’t, she moved her hand down from the cap to above her left eye and she found the source of liquid flowing down her face.

_Deep laceration in the left frontotemporal region, likely venous as there is no pulsatile flow._

She trailed the hand down below her eye and felt along her cheekbones, pressing and wincing at contact on the left side.

_Forming hematoma, possible fracture of the left orbit._

She let her hand drift over to her nose, tracing the shape of it. She squeezed the bridge of it, before moving down to her chin, pressing along the strong line there to either side and traveling to her ears.

_No clear CSF leakage from the ears. No break in the nasal bone. No mandibular fracture._

She lightly rotated her head from side to side then up and down.

_Expected soreness in cervical musculature, full active ROM without concerning discomfort._

Letting the hand drift down she palpated along her neck.

_Trachea midline, no JVD._

Her hand reached her clavicles and she followed along the left side, feeling a dip as she walked out.

_Broken left clavicle._

At least a partial explanation for her arm’s odd position. She struggled to move her hand out to her shoulder without shifting her whole position. She walked the hand out as smoothly as she could without turning her torso.

_Humeral head dislocated anteriorly._

Another reason for the discomfort in the arm. She stopped there, holding her left arm near the shoulder and took another set of deep breaths in and out.

_Just gotta do it. Come on, Collar. Do it. Now!_

She used all her energy to roll her body over her injured shoulder, stabilizing it with her right arm, so that she was on her back.

“Oh, motherfucking shitbags,” she wheezed, her vision darkened again as pain erupted through her body. Every beat of her heart played loudly against her skull. It was all she could think about, the pain. It was everything and she was nothing at the moment, nothing except a victim to it.

“Please, please, please,” she whimpered to no one in particular, wishing it would stop, feeling her eyes leak tears at their corners. She focused on every breath in and out until finally it began to ebb again back to a steady instead of searing pain.

She opened her eyes, seeing the night sky above her from her new position. It was night. It had been night when she was woken from her bed by a wide eyed private in the barracks. She had forgotten the call pager, again, hence the in person wake up call. They needed her to help, to fix, a group of soldiers who had been on patrol and attacked. They were lured into a corner where an orchestrated attack and a car bomb awaited them. Reinforcements had barely gotten any of them out alive. It was the Camarilla, it had to be.

She had slipped on her boots, stopping only to pick up her jacket, scrub cap, and stethoscope before making her way to the door. Just before the exit, she saw Bellweather and Craven move to sit up from their beds. She waved them off and they started to lie back down as she made her way out.

It was a short walk to medical through the cold night. She looked up at the sky as she tossed the stethoscope in her pants pocket. There wasn’t a cloud in the sky. Bright stars twinkled back at her from their place far up in the sky. She tied her hair back. It was all routine, every part of this, she completed most of it on autopilot. After the hair, she slipped the scrub cap on. Twenty more steps then turn up the street and make for the small building they had converted into a medical facility. It was split in equal parts into two ORs and a large triage hub in the center.

There were times when the procedures happened right in the triage hub instead of the ORs. Trauma could be a bitch and as such wasn’t often willing to wait for anyone to move things to a nice and sterile part of the building after the doctors had taken the time to scrub.

She sighed, regretting switching shifts with Jameson. She had hoped the Thursday night would be quiet and she could get some sleep. The schedule swap had let her share a night off with both Tally and Abigail and had seemed like such a good idea when she had agreed to it. She would get a night with her best friends, Jameson would cover and then she would pick up his Thursday allowing him to video call his family back home without interruptions. It seemed great, until here she was, dragged out of bed in the middle of the night for a multiple casualty incident. It was the job, she knew that, it didn’t make it suck any less.

It was no time at all before she stood outside the hub’s large wooden doors. She took a deep breath in and focused on the out before she entered, centering herself for whatever lay on the other side of that door. At the end of the breath, she nodded to herself and pushed it open.

There were eight cots of patients scattered out around the hub, some with curtain partitions up for privacy. The medics, doctors, and nurses surrounding each cot worked to start IVs, run assessments, stop bleeding.

“Collar,” Dr. L’Amara, a senior trauma surgeon, grabbed my attention from where she stood over a cot with a soldier with a gaping leg wound. Both a medic and Dr. L’Amara were holding pressure on wound with large ABD gauze pads. The medic next to her shifted just enough to let pressure off and a brilliant spurt of bright red blood flew up and over Dr. L’Amara’s shoulder. She slid a quick hand down the wound, glaring at the medic beside her who had the sense to look properly chastised as she spoke, “You’re needed at bed three, likely surgical.”

Raelle nodded, making her way to the curtained off area in the corner close to one of the ORs that was reserved for patients that would likely make their way to the OR at some point or another. She pulled the curtain back to find a girl who couldn’t have been much older than eighteen. She was struggling against the medics there, two trying to calm her down as a nurse drew up a medication.

“What have we got?” The surgeon asked calmly, feeling the eyes of all four people in the enclosure snap to her.

“18-year-old female, no past medical history, no allergies, was in the blast zone. Complaining of abdominal pain, leg pain. Looks like a femur fracture, doc.”

She nodded, putting on a set of gloves and grabbing her stethoscope out of her pants pocket.

“Morphine’s in,” the nurse said to the others before stepping out of the curtained area, likely to help another patient. A medic, Weatherly it looked like, wrote the time down on the back of his gloved hand. The patient continued to shift uncomfortably, groaning in pain at every slight movement.

“No, no, no, no, no,” the girl chanted. Raelle sat down on the cot so she was eye level with the soldier.

“You’re going to be okay.” She said solemnly, meaning it. She would do everything in her power to make that true. She was already conducting her primary assessment noting the board strapped to stabilize the patient’s obviously broken leg, blood pouring from a cut on her upper chest. Her body was littered with dirt, smoke, and abrasions. She must have been blonde before the accident, her natural color shining through where her helmet had been on her head, an amber hue streaked across the center of it with its source buried near her hairline. “Can you tell me your name, private?”

She said something unintelligible before beginning her chant again.

Williamson was what the Velcro strip on her flak jacket said, the jacket pulled to the side.

“Private Williamson, I’m Dr. Collar, one of the trauma surgeons. I’m going to do my exam as quickly and painlessly as possible, but some parts of it might hurt, okay?”

She waited for a miniscule nod from the soldier who continued to whimper, though at a slightly quieter volume now as the morphine started to work.

“I’m going to need to take your vest and everything off so I can see where you’re injured. Would you like the medics to leave while we do that?”

The girl shot a frantic look at both the male medics in the room before nodding again.

Raelle smiled briefly before grabbing her trauma shears as the medics slipped beyond the curtain. She delicately cut fabric as she moved swiftly from head to toe completing her assessment, diagnoses floating in as she went.

_Concussion, plenty of scalp hematomas, will need a CT head. Seven lacerations deep enough to need stitches in various parts of her body, the chest wound might have been her saving grace as she likely had a tension pneumothorax that it helped relieve, broken ribs, six on the side of the chest wound. Rigid abdomen meaning there had to be some internal bleeding, likely from the liver if she had to guess given the damage to the ribs. Obvious deformity of the femur. Shrapnel embedded on her entire right side, not uncommon from a blast, but increasing risk of infection._

“I need the ultrasound,” Raelle spoke to the shadows behind the drape. One moved swiftly and then handed her a box that she opened and turned on. She grabbed gel before turning to the patient, laid bare before her. “This gel is going to feel cool, okay?”

She skillfully floated the ultrasound to five different spots, not liking what she saw on the right side. Internal bleeding, confirmed. She grabbed a blanket and gown from the foot locker at the end of the cot and helped the patient into it before draping the blanket over her.

“That blast looks like it might have impacted your liver, there’s some bleeding in the capsule around it on ultrasound. The best thing for us to do right now is take you to the OR. You also likely have a break in your leg bone. We are going to have to take you to the OR, okay?” Raelle asked as the girl blinked helplessly up at her, nodding only slightly.

Raelle took the gloves off as she stepped through the curtain, finding only Weatherly standing outside the curtain.

“She’s going to need to be prepped and taken to the OR ASAP,” Raelle told the medics. “And I’ll need ortho in there as well, might need a film before they tackle it. Head CT first.”

The medic nodded before going back through the curtain. Raelle looked around again, seeing one bed with a sheet pulled over the outline of a body resting on it.

“Died on blast impact, unfortunately,” Dr. L’Amara informed her matter of fact, wiping at the blood on her shoulder with a towel. “Yours need the OR?”

She nodded, “surgical abdomen, FAST exam concerning for bleeding into the liver capsule. Also did a heck of number on her femur.”

“Did you want ortho right away?”

“Yeah, but I’ll need to make sure she survives the abdominal bleeding first. Probably needs a chest tube too. She’s got a big ol’ chest wound doing the job now, but we will have to close that.”

L’Amara tossed her used towel into a basket to their left. “I’ll be your first assist if you want. And I can grab Treino to help with the leg. You’re getting a head CT before they prep?”

“Of course,” Raelle smiled, turning to face her, “I did, after all, learn from the best.”

L’Amara laughed, clasping her hand briefly on Raelle’s shoulder as she passed, “That you did, kid.”

Raelle went and grabbed a juice and protein bar from a fridge in the back. She chewed thoughtfully on the bar for a minute entirely jealous of Bellweather and Craven who were warm and cozy in their beds right now while she prepped for an emergency surgery. She could bet Abigail was going to rub it in at breakfast the next morning.

 _You’re the one who wanted to be a doctor, Collar,_ she would remind her as she did on a semi-regular basis that they had started on the same path, until Raelle had decided she had outgrown her medic role and went back to school for more training. She was reunited after graduation with Abi and Tally who had grown several ranks during her schooling.

“Ready for you, doc,” Weatherly told her and she smiled tiredly up at him in thanks before making her way to scrub in. She visualized every step she would take for the task ahead.

“Alright, Collar,” L’Amara said, beginning her scrub in the sink next to her. “Let’s go save a life, huh?”

Raelle hit the pump to shut the sink off with her foot, holding her arms up as she backed into the OR.

It wasn’t a routine surgery by any means. Routine hardly exists in the world of trauma surgery which is part of what drew her to it in the first place. She and Dr. L’Amara as her assist were systematically working through the complications as they encountered them. She had just isolated the bleed in the retroperitoneum when it happened.

There was a moment then, of quiet, of nothing but the sound of two surgeons working and the steady beep of the monitor at the head of the bed. Then, a bright light, Raelle lifting her hand to shield her eyes. Then floating through the air, backwards until landing squarely on her left shoulder, her head echoing as it found home on the ground.

An explosion. There had been an explosion. From outside the OR, that had to be true. If it had been inside, she would not have survived it and where would it have come from.

Blinking back to the present, she looked rapidly around her for any sign of the patient or Dr. L’Amara or the scrub tech. There was nothing but rubble and night sky around her. There was no sound of movement nearby.

They had to be coming. People had to be coming, either from the village or the barracks or the triage hub.

_Unless…_

Unless the explosion had come from the triage hub. Or the vehicles outside of it. Or the building next door. They were in a warzone; it could have come from anywhere. One fact rang true, the Camarilla never played fair, why would they start now?

Attacking medical personnel or medical buildings that were identified was a violation of international rights. Another dark mark on the record of the ruthless organization.

She adjusted her right arm to better grasp her left shoulder, feeling something pinch near the elbow on her left and she looked down to see a piece of metal, a surgical retractor of all things, sitting proud where it was lodged firmly and deeply in her abdomen.

 _Never thought it would be my own surgical tool taking me out,_ she thought morosely knowing where the tool lay was directly over her spleen.

She thought of Tally and Abigail, hoping the blast was confined to the medical tent and the two were safe. She thought of her father and how he would receive the flag at her funeral, a second flag for a man who will have lost his wife and now his daughter in the military. She thought about her mother and the moments before she died.

_Had she known she was dying? Had she had time like this to think about me and dad?_

Raelle could feel herself fading fast. She suddenly, wasn’t all that sure anyone was coming for her. She thought maybe this was where she would die. The loneliness of it all sweeping over her. She closed her eyes and the briefest flash of bright blue flooded her vision.

_Of course._

She stopped fighting it as the image fully formed behind her eyelids. Of course, her mind wouldn’t let her forget the one person she equal parts never wanted to see again and couldn’t help but want to see one last time. Ocean blue eyes, a mischievous smirk, wavy brunette hair, and that ridiculous red bandana tied around her neck.

_Scylla Ramshorn._

*****

_“Tal, that makes no sense. You get that, right?”_

_Two soldiers stood behind a sandbagged entrance in front of a heavily fenced area._

_“I really don’t,” the redheaded one stated, adjusting her grip on her weapon where it rest across her chest. The safety was on as they stood guard, watching people going to the village walk by on the busy path across from the barricade in front of them._

_The other soldier was slightly taller than her counterpart. Both were in their uniforms, flak jackets and helmets in place. Rifles in their arms, but pointed downward. The redhead had a lither form than the brunette who carried herself with an almost regal posture, the uniform not enough to disguise the power that lay beneath it._

_The brunette turned slightly angling towards the other girl, with her eyes still on the path in front of them. “Tally, you cannot seriously think if you wear white to your ex-whatever-he-was’s wedding that his fiancé isn’t going to murder you.”_

_The redhead shrugged, “I look really good in white, Abi.” She reached a hand up to wipe at her forehead. “He knew that when he hooked up with me. He knew that when he led me on for 10 months. He knew that when his fiancé returned from assignment and walked in on us. He also knew that when he invited me to the wedding.”_

_Abigail rolled her eyes, before narrowing them, “So your argument is that he shouldn’t have invited you to the wedding if he doesn’t expect you to show up in white?”_

_Tally thought for a moment, then bobbled her head from side to side before saying, “Well, kind of. I mean, why else would he invite me?”_

_“That logic completely escapes –“ Abigail started, trailing off as she noticed a person attempting to meander through a barrier just to their right. She raised her weapon, Tally doing the same. “Hold it.”_

_The figure froze midstep. There was a headscarf obscuring her face from their angle, but the two knew exactly who it was. The average height and slight build did nothing to give away the identity. The intent, though, and the boldness. That was a dead giveaway._

_“Damn it, Ramshorn,” Abigail sighed, lowering her weapon, “you know we could shoot you one of these times, right?”_

_The woman turned slowly towards the soldiers. She had bright blue eyes and shoulder length wavy brunette hair. She was dressed in nondescript clothing. Well-worn boots on her feet. A canvas messenger bag across her shoulders. There was an attempt at charming smile playing on her lips._

_“Oh, you two would never do that to me though, would you?”_

_A faint Swedish accent lingered on the words, light and playful as she smiled at the soldiers._

_“No, of course not – “_

_“Try me one more time and I’ll – “_

_The soldiers replied over each other, stopping midsentence upon hearing what the other had said._

_“Uniform front, Tal,” Abigail said under her breath._

_“We aren’t actually going to shoot her though, are we?”_

_Ramshorn raised one eyebrow at the interaction._

_“Don’t know why you’re here anyways, she’s off base,” Tally said while ignoring the disapproving look from Abigail._

_Scylla shifted on the dirt in front of her, “I wasn’t looking for anyone.”_

_She tried for nonchalant, arms out at her sides._

_Abigail snorted, “You know, Ramshorn, for an intelligence officer, you sure do suck at gathering intel. What did you walk down here and think you could just slink onto base?”_

_“Ah, Bellweather, it’s touching that you think I’m capable of slinking.” She held a hand to her chest in mock gratitude. “I never thought I could slink so low.”_

_“Goddess, a pun? Really, that’s the level of humor you’re at now?” Abigail spat out, incredulous._

_Tally cut in, “I actually think her using puns is impressive given English isn’t her first language and all.”_

_Scylla had always liked her, she smiled broadly at the redhead, then found it slowly slipping from her face as she continued._

_“And what’s the harm in her finding Rae anyways? They can banter, she can ask her out again, Rae can reject her again, everyone moves on until we do it all over again tomorrow.”_

_Perhaps, Scylla had spoken too soon._

_“The harm,” Abigail emphasized the word, “is in someone that is not military knowing the whereabouts of our medical team.”_

_Ah, there it was. Off base with the medical team. Scylla clapped her hands together, breaking the two from their argument._

_“Supply run, then.” She began step backwards, taking large, almost bounding steps. “Thank you, ladies. Bellweather, always a pleasure.” She mock saluted as she wound her way into the crowd and disappeared just as quickly and easily as she had appeared._

_Tally let out a low laugh. Abigail turned to her, frowning._

_“What?”_

_“She never wanted on the base.” The redhead smiled as she shook her head in disbelief and a touch of admiration, “We just saved her hours of looking around the village.” A pause, then, “Not so bad at gathering intel after all, huh?”_

_“Shut up, Tally.” Abigail stewed for a minute or so before adjusting, “Can we get back to your actual deathwish of a plan of wearing white to Gerit’s wedding?”_

_Down the street, Scylla pulled off her head scarf, folding it and placing it her bag. She then took out her red bandana and winding it around her neck to rest comfortably above the rough and worn fabric of her loose button up. She knew these streets better than most and floated at a brisk, but comfortable pace to the Central market where she now knew she would find one blonde trauma surgeon._

_She smiled genuinely when she spotted the blonde bartering with a man selling vegetables. The surgeon was wearing civilian clothes attempting to blend into the crowd although with her complexion and hair color, she stood out in the town where most locals had generations of adaptations to protect them from the desert sun. Scylla always liked it when she wore her civilian clothes. Made it easier to pretend they weren’t who they were for a couple of brief moments._

_“I hear the mushrooms are to die for,” she rasped in the blonde’s ear when she was next to her._

_The blonde startled at first, then recovered quickly, “Ah, Scylla. If it isn’t my least favorite mercenary.”_

_“Not a mercenary,” the practiced correction fell from her lips before she fully processed. “Wait a second, least favorite?”_

_Raelle let out a small laugh at the pout on her face, turning her focus back to where the merchant was bagging the items she requested._

_“I think we probably only have enough time for you to be upset about one or the other at this point, so you’re choosing that?”_

_“Oh, no. I would very much like to continue discussing the many reasons that I am anything but a mercenary with you, Dr. Collar, however,” Scylla tossed a set of coins to the merchant before Raelle could reach her money. “I do believe we have much more important matters to discuss with our limited time.”_

_Raelle shook her head as she accepted the sack of assorted vegetables with a thanks to the merchant._

_“You shouldn’t pay for my things.” She admonished halfheartedly._

_Ignoring the comment, Scylla continued, “So onto those more important manners. What night this week would be good for you?”_

_Raelle rolled her eyes, knowing exactly where this was heading._

_“I’m open Thursday, could probably do Friday if that worked better, though. My weekend is shit.” She rambled on, “You know how work gets sometimes.”_

_The blonde shook her head. Best to get this done earlier in the day, she supposed. They continued to walk towards the apothecary near the edge of the market. A military truck was parked just outside it._

_“I’m not going out with you, Scylla.”_

_There was a weary frame to her words, this very conversation taking place on a nearly daily basis for the last several months._

_The brunette was not deterred by her statement. In fact, she brightened slightly at the expected reply. “Okay, but hear me out – “_

_“I don’t date mercenaries.”_

_“So, you always say that, Dr. C, but that’s where you’re going about this all wrong.” Scylla tugged lightly on the sack of vegetables in Raelle’s hand until she reluctantly handed it over. The brunette swung the bag over her shoulder as she pointed out, “First of all, who said anything about dating?”_

_She punctuated the question with a waggle of her eyebrows that the blonde couldn’t have stopped herself from laughing at if she tried._

_“See, I make you laugh. Laughing is universally accepted as a good sign. You make a woman laugh in the streets, you can…” Scylla trailed off, suddenly uncertain if she was translating this properly. “Make her laugh in the sheets?” A puzzled look crossed her face, “That can’t be right.”_

_The surgeon shook her head in amusement, laughing again as they approached the truck. There were a group of soldiers who looked to be finishing loading supplies._

_Raelle took the sack back from her, lightly, “Not a saying, Scyl.”_

_“Ready to go, Collar,” a soldier shot out less of question and more an order as they cranked the engine. The blonde nodded her assent and made to get into the cab of the truck._

_Scylla sidestepped in front of her with an impressive burst of agility, “Wait, you haven’t even heard the second part of my argument yet.”_

_“And what’s that?”_

_“I’m not a mercenary.”_

_Another part of the song and dance. Raelle raised an eyebrow at the woman who was grinning expectantly at her._

_“Goodbye, Scyl.”_

_She stepped around the brunette and climbed up to the open door of the cab of the truck._

_“Thursday night, then?” Scylla called after her, shouting over the loud engine and everyone within a five-foot radius heard her._

_Raelle felt all eyes in the cab of the truck on her as her cheeks flushed._

_“In your dreams, Ramshorn,” the surgeon shouted out the cab window as the truck began to move away._

_The “not” mercenary smiled, laughing, “You’re not wrong!”_

_When they had first arrived on base, the initial briefing included a who’s who of the locals and other agencies they’d be interacting with. The presentation was droning on and Raelle had barely gotten any sleep on the flight over dealing with treating the impressive number of soldiers with air sickness, a couple so bad they needed IV rehydration. Then, they flicked up a slide with 15 or so faces under the banner Spree Security Contractors. There in the second row, third across was a face that looked like it belonged more in a magazine than a military brief._

Scylla Ramshorn

Ex-Swedish International

Intelligence Officer

_Shame a face that pretty was a soldier for hire. She had heard of Spree Security before on past deployments. They were a relatively no-nonsense organization. She knew from her own intelligence officer, Tally, that the military had been keeping a close eye on the Spree as an aside while they focused on the movements of the Camarilla. The Spree seemed to operate in parallel channels to the Camarilla. Often running ops in clear daylight and running many more under whatever cover was afforded to them. It was incredibly complex, from what Tally had said._

_And if she had maybe asked Tally about a certain intelligence officer a week or two after she was on base, it had been subtle and flanked by asking about other agents in the organization. Her best friends definitely hadn’t picked up on the blush that covered her cheeks as she had asked. They definitely hadn’t continued to give her shit at every turn once the two had actually met and they would never refer to the woman as Rae’s Spree “girlfriend.”_

_The thing is, Scylla wasn’t her girlfriend. Not for Scylla’s lack of trying, that is. The only thing more expected in the desert in dry season than lack of rain was Scylla Ramshorn asking out Raelle Collar and Raelle Collar turning her down. It had evolved into one of those base legends as Scylla became more and more bold in her attempts._

_They were all in good nature, Raelle knew that. She also knew if she had even hinted that it was making her uncomfortable Scylla would stop. But it was harmless. Nothing was ever going to come of it. There was something in the chase that broke up the monotony of daily life in the desert. If she ever did say yes one day, it might be enough to actually stun Scylla Ramshorn into silence. She had been holding that one in her back pocket for some special occasion._

_The real thing is, if they had met in any other way, as any other people, Raelle wasn’t all that certain there would have been a chase. Scylla was exactly her type in more ways than one. Her intelligence and wit were just as attractive as her appearance. The mystery that shrouded the Spree extended over the brunette and only added to the allure._

_But they weren’t different people. Scylla was Spree and Raelle would not date a mercenary._

_Not when it was a group of mercenaries that were responsible for her mother’s death. She couldn’t align with their mission of completing work for the highest bidder. She had been on the other side of that, had been at a funeral as a result of that, had lived with the knowledge that soldiers for hire received a call one day and went and murdered her mother simply because someone had paid them to. There was something so morally gray about the way they operated._

_So, she let Scylla flirt with her and if some days she flirted back she would blame it on base boredom and not genuine interest. She knew it would never go anywhere because she would never let it go anywhere. Scylla Ramshorn was a mercenary and she didn’t date mercenaries._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey all! It's been a very long time since I've written anything so please excuse me while I shake the rust off a bit. Would love to have any and all feedback, favorite quotes, predictions, anything y'all have! Thanks for reading!


	2. Just another op

Chapter 2

There was a sense of urgency in the actions of every soldier on base that night. Abigail Bellweather was doing her best to push away the ominous sense of lateness that was stubbornly and periodically washing over her.

 _No freaking way that shitbird’s going to die on me like this,_ Abigail thought, taking up the pace of their pursuit another half notch. On the horizon lay the still smoldering outline of what had been the medical building.

Abigail was the at the front of the charge with Mueller, Anderson, and Hart in formation on her heels. Tally was in position as rearguard. They moved with the swift precision countless operations and drills had granted them. Nonetheless, there was a barely perceptible edge present, a kind of frayed reminder of how this was different than anything before.

 _It’s just another op,_ Abigail had on repeat in her head. _It’s just another op. It’s just another op._

But it wasn’t. She knew that.

Abigail had been sleeping when she heard the first blast. She had shot up in her bed as the aftershocks shook the bed beneath her. Her eyes instinctively fell to Tally who she noticed was similarly positioned in her own bed with a startled and weary expression on her face. The two simultaneously turned to the third bed in their room only to find it empty.

Memory flooded back of quiet whispers, Raelle shifting in bed and lacing her boots before heading toward the door. Abigail was a notoriously heavy sleeper, to the point where the veterans on the squad had developed it into a sort of hazing they couldn’t actually call hazing because of new army regulations. Regardless of the title, new squad members would be charged with a variety of loud tasks outside of Abigail and Tally’s door and then scatter when the door inevitably opened. Tally had started sleeping with heavy duty ear plugs after they piloted the first round of it. Ultimately, the new squad members would get some cred if they managed to wake Abigail up and also not get murdered by her in the process. It was a fine line some nights.

She wouldn’t have heard any of it had it not been for the giant bottle of water she had downed just before bedtime that forced her to wake up not once, but twice to empty her bladder. The damned desert heat made her constantly thirsty with no regard to the consequences on her sleep cycle. She had been drifting back to sleep before the whispers kept her from falling deeper. She lifted her head in question as Raelle, pillow lines on her face, had tiredly motioned for her to go back to sleep. The surgeon had to have forgotten the call pager again if some unlucky private had been sent to grab her.

Abigail felt a nearly palpable veil of dread and uncertainty wash over her. It turned her stomach uncomfortably. That blast was too loud. It was too close. The series of smaller explosions that followed had not inspired any more comfort.

She could see the same thoughts crossing Tally’s mind as the two sat uncharacteristically frozen in their beds.

Suddenly, the door to their room flung open startling both with the force. Looking past its frame, they saw Staff Sergeant Anacostia Quartermaine walk away in full combat gear. It was something that truly leant itself to Tally’s theory that the woman slept in all of her gear and also to Raelle’s theory that the woman didn’t sleep at all. Abigail filed it away to share with Raelle when they met up. Because they had to meet up. Raelle would be fine. She was in the medical building, she was safe. She had to be.

The sound of more doors slamming open echoed from the hallway.

“Everyone up. Now! We’ve got an explosion on base,” Anacostia’s voice was amplified along the narrows of the hall. “I need you all dressed and ready for orders in five.”

It was enough to shake them out of their stupors. Both Tally and Abigail mindlessly went through the motions of putting on their gear.

_Raelle was fine. She was safe in medical. Maybe she was even busy dealing with the aftermath of this explosion._

Abigail swung her flak jacket over her uniform, velcroing it in place before she picked up her ruck from its place at the foot of her bed. She placed her helmet over her head, leaving it unbuckled for now. Shifting her ruck on her shoulders, she stepped into the hallway and followed members of her squad as they made their way outside.

Adrenaline pulsed in the cool air that greeted them. Words were whispered cautiously between soldiers who were trying to decipher details no one had been made privy to yet. Abigail stayed silent.

_Raelle is fine. She’s okay. Tally is beside you. You’re okay._

Tally was just off her shoulder as they joined their squadmates’ huddle. She was rocking onto her tip toes to try and see past the barracks that blocked view of the base from where they stood, to try and see where the blast had come from.

The base that had only moments earlier been in various stages of sleep was now in a flurry of motion. Soldiers from other squads were rolling out of the barracks in the same manner they had, bleary eyed and trying to figure out whether this was real or part of some elaborate drill. There was an undercurrent of action without any activity to direct the energy toward.

At last, their Staff Sergeant reappeared. She gestured for the squad to gather around her. Tally chose to hang near the back continuing her visual sweep of the base with Abigail at her side.

Anacostia Quartermaine wished more than anything that she didn’t have to deliver this news. She wished more than anything that she could go back to her bed, fall asleep, and awake tomorrow to find this had all been some sort of a terrible nightmare. She might even give a certain trio a week’s worth of dish duty for their dream counterparts’ roles in the mess. But, this wasn’t something she could wake up from.

She looked over her squad and the faces that looked back seemed younger than they ever had before. She caught the eye of Abigail over the crowd and tried to deliver some kind of silent warning about what she was about to say.

Abigail felt her stomach drop at the look Anacostia was giving her. She blindly reached out for Tally beside her. Her right-hand found sleeve and then forearm. She felt Tally’s attention swing towards Abigail and then Anacostia who was looking at the pair with resignation on her face.

“Listen up,” Anacostia started. Abigail felt her stomach churning again and bile rising in her throat. She waited for the words to cross the Staff Sergeant’s lips. She needed to hear them spoken out loud. Her white-knuckle grip on Tally’s sleeve was gently loosened as Tally laced their fingers together instead. “Here’s what we know and it’s not much. This is not a drill,” she emphasized to start out, “There have been a series of explosions on base with their epicenter at the medical building. There were personnel in the building at the time of explosion working on a unit that had been ambushed out on patrols.”

Abigail swallowed audibly, her mouth suddenly dryer than it had ever been, desert or not. Tally kept looking forward with her eyes fixed just over the shoulder of her Staff Sergeant as she talked. The rest of the squad did the two the small favor of keeping their attention entirely forward as their commanding officer continued. They knew what face was missing from the half circle around them and they knew what that news meant to their sergeants.

“We will be split into two teams; however, they will not be your normal fire teams. Five of you will be clearing the building and marking those within for extraction as alpha team.”

“Alpha will be led by Sgt. Bellweather and Sgt. Craven with Anderson, Hart, and Mueller,” she listed off. “Everyone else will be with me as beta team helping to secure the perimeter before alpha can move in. Am I clear?”

“Yes, ma’am,” came the uniform reply.

“Alpha on me. Bravo split and wait for me near the entrance of the barracks.”

Bravo team peeled off leaving only the five soldiers of Alpha and the Staff Sergeant. Abigail and Tally took one step in after they had left, the grip on each other’s hand was nearing on painful and it wasn’t clear who was squeezing harder.

“I need you to prepare yourselves.” Anacostia said in a soft, but firm tone. “I’m not going to sugarcoat this. Those are our people over there and this does not look good. Do your best to stay focused on the objective. We will deal with the fallout as a squad.”

Solemn nods from the small group around her.

“You’ll all be needing a handful of tracers, green for survivors, red for any deceased you come across. Remember your training. You need to treat this as a hostile environment. We do not know what caused the explosion. If there is any chance any person who orchestrated this is still on this base, even in that building, we want to be prepared.”

A chorus of yes, ma’ams.

“Sgt. Craven, Sgt. Bellweather, I need a word. Mueller, Anderson, Hart,” Anacostia jerked her head to the side and the three moved out of earshot. The Sergeants stood immobile, still as statues. If it weren’t for the slight tremor, Anacostia would have thought they were frozen all the way through. They looked more like the soldiers she had seen and trained years ago, not like the confident, seasoned veterans they were.

“She was in there,” Tally’s voice shook as she spoke, “Raelle was in there and she – “

She couldn’t finish the sentence. She didn’t even want to finish the thought.

“I know,” Anacostia reached out and bracketed their outside shoulders with a hand on each of them. “I also know that she’s stubborn as hell. If she’s alive in there, she’s going to need us to get her out of there and give her a fighting chance.”

The two nodded at the sentiment. Abigail knew it was the best mindset to go into this. She could deal with her emotions later. Now wasn’t the time.

She squeezed Tally’s hand once before loosening her grip. When she met her eyes, finding the same resolve there. Tally squeezed back before they let go, engaging now in business mode. Best friend mode would have to wait. Raelle needed them.

“I’m trusting you two to stay focused in there. You’re looking for Raelle, but you’re also looking for every other person that was in that building at the time of the blast. Got it?”

“Yes, ma’am.” Abigail firmly replied, adjusting her posture to stand at full height.

“Questions?” Anacostia implored.

“No, ma’am,” both stated. Anacostia nodded, giving each of their shoulders a pat that she hoped communicated every bit of what she couldn’t say before she walked toward her own team.

Abigail and Tally called their team around them.

“It’ll be masks on in there. We aren’t fire fighters so if there’s a room that’s too far gone, we communicate it and move on. Everything should be done on your comms. Find a person, place a tracer, call it in, stabilize any survivors until the extraction team arrives then you’re onto the next. If it’s easier and closer to move survivors out of the building then grab a buddy and pull them out.”

The team watched as Bravo began their charge to secure the perimeter knowing this was the first step to getting in that building.

“We go as soon as we hear the call,” Abigail said firmly. “Get your masks on.”

The squad stepped back and did one last equipment check. Abigail checked and rechecked every piece of her gear. She secured her mask and checked for any leaks. She buckled her helmet snuggly below her chin. And she anxiously awaited the call to action, hearing Beta and several other teams quickly securing their perimeter without meeting any resistance in their reports on the comms. It was reassuring that they hadn’t encountered any insurgents, although it did nothing to ease the anxiety brewing deep within her.

After what felt like ages, she heard her team name over the comms. Abigail moved to wordlessly begin a measured, but brisk pace around the barracks and toward the medical building. She could feel her heart beating steadily in her chest and tried not to acknowledge that it seemed to be attempting to escape her chest.

Her breath caught as they came within eyeline of what had once been the medical building. It could no longer be called a building at all. There were small fires outside in disconnected patches, smoke rising steadily from where the roof had been. The medical chopper that rest on a helipad next to the building was in flames, perhaps a source of one of the secondary explosions. The archway where the entrance was still had its shape whereas most of the surrounding walls had toppled.

Abigail motioned to Mueller behind her to slow. She rest her shoulder against the archway, feeling heat coming off the stone then gestured for the squad to enter the building with weapons raised and flashlights on. They moved quickly into the triage hub.

“Alpha team moving into the main room,” she spoke softly into the comms knowing every soldier was listening to hear report of what they found.

Abigail couldn’t stop the memory of the tour they had taken with Raelle when she first arrived splinter into her consciousness. The blonde had excitedly brought them into a medical building that they had already been orientated to. Raelle had looked every bit like a proud parent as she showed them where she would be operating. She had been so excited to be in the field again with the two of them at her side.

Abigail shoved the memory away as she kicked her way through the debris as she moved, eyes sweeping and trying not to focus on the carnage that was present around her. This had to have been the primary explosion’s source. She gestured at her squad to spread out, pointing at her eyes to remind them to stay vigilant.

She stepped over rubble, feeling the crunch of glass under her boots. Her breaths came out in short bursts against the mask.

_How could anyone survive this?_

She shot the voice down. Refusing to give it any air. But she knew. This was bad. It didn’t look like anyone in the immediate blast zone could have survived it. There was no noise over the comms, no calling out because none of them had found any trace of the people who had been in the building.

“Craven, Hart, Anderson, anything?”

Three identical nothings sounded over her headset.

“Alpha has cleared the main room,” she breathed out into her comms. “No signs of any recoverable dead or survivors.”

“Alpha splitting to look in southeast and southwest corners,” Abigail got the attention of Anderson and Hart beside her and gestured towards the far corners of the room where small parts of the dividing walls had stood. Nodding to Tally as she split with Mueller towards the other side.

The obliterated wall that divided the rooms had absorbed enough of the blast that even with everything turned on its side, there were more identifiable pieces in the room. It gave Abigail a small fragment of hope.

_Maybe. Just maybe._

Abigail heard crackling over the radio, Tally’s voice coming through. “Two DOAs in the southwest corner,” she communicated across the airwaves. “Two living, in need of extraction.”

Abigail’s heart thumped in her chest. Tally’s voice had betrayed nothing.

“Sergeant,” Anderson called out, squatting beside an overturned table. Abigail rushed over, feeling adrenaline spike with her movements. She took a deep breath as she approached and squatted next to Anderson. Her blood ran cold, all hope washing out of her.

There was a body lying face down next to the table. It was a slight and short in statue with blonde, messy hair at its head. She moved an unsteady hand to help Anderson turn the unmoving body onto its back.

She braced herself to see the face of her best friend staring lifelessly back at her. It felt like she might pass out from the uneasiness she felt. Instead, she found the face of a soldier she had only ever seen in passing on base. Williamson, she thinks the name was.

She calmed her beating heart, suppressing the bile rising in her throat as she moved to the girl’s neck, waiting for a minute without feeling any beats but those from her own blood racing through her hand.

She looked to Anderson with a shake of her head and the two stood before Anderson tossed a red tracer back where the soldier lay.

“We have one DOA in the southeast corner,” Anderson relayed into her comms.

Anderson fanned out from where she stood and Abigail exhaled, closing her eyes for a second before opening them and doing the same.

Mueller’s voice crackled on the radio, “Another DOA in the southwest corner.”

“Hey, I’ve got a live one over here,” Hart called and Abigail moved more steadily this time over to her.

There on the ground amongst the debris was Dr. L’Amara coughing slightly at the smoke that filled the air, but very much alive. Abigail squatted down and placed a green tracer on the woman.

“Call it in,” Abigail said, pulling out a spare water and helping the senior surgeon drink.

“One living in the southeast, needing extraction,” Hart spoke across the airwaves.

“Can you stand?” Abigail asked the surgeon who shook her head.

“Did something to my knee and who knows what else.”

Abigail nodded, “Hart will stay with you until a team comes to grab you.”

She gave the surgeon a weak smile before moving to stand.

“Collar,” L’Amara breathed out, freezing Abigail somewhere between a squat and standing. “She was in this OR with me. Me, her, Davis with anesthesia, Ludlow one of the scrub techs, and a patient.”

Two members of the extraction team arrived slightly out of breath with a stretcher they helped L’Amara onto. The surgeon gave Abigail an imploring look to find the others before they took her away.

“Two more DOAs in the southeast,” Anderson announced. Abigail looked over to see her shining a light on a broad shouldered and tall body and a smaller body next to it. Anderson placed two red tracers.

_Come on, Collar. Please be in this room. And please be alive._

_Please, goddess, please._

Abigail turned back and pushed through more debris, concern building within as she heard no more calls over the comms.

_She had to be here._

Her eyes fell on a broken pipe in the corner that was spilling water into the room. She swept the room again, lifting her flashlight as she stepped over a large piece of the roof that had fallen and divided the room. And then...

“Collar,” She said under her breath, nearly tripping in her haste to get to the surgeon who was there with her face to the night sky. She was there.

“Rae!” She shouted, shaking the motionless blonde and nearly sobbing in relief when she heard a groan in reply.

Her face was covered in blood, surgical gown frayed from the explosion. Her right arm was draped across her body to where her left lay with wrist turned out at an unnatural angle. There was a piece of metal lodged in the right side of her belly.

“Collar, hey shitbird, you gotta stay with me, okay?” Raelle’s eyes remained closed, Abigail’s fingers going to her neck and finding a weak and thready pulse there, her chest rising not in the uniform pattern that it should be, but with a side tilt to each breath. She shakily breathed into the comms, “One alive in the southeast corner. I need an extraction team and I need them now!”

Abigail fished out her canteen, splashing water onto Raelle’s face to try and trace where the blood was coming from. She recoiled slightly at the water, grumbling unintelligibly.

_We have her. We found her._

But would it be enough?

An extraction team appeared at her side for transport. Abigail helped them move her onto the stretcher before using the comms, “All accounted for in the southeast room, moving out.”

She followed the stretcher with Anderson and Hart behind her. They moved through the triage hub and back into the night.

She whipped her mask off as soon as they were outdoors. Dr. Jameson came running to meet them as they moved a safe distance from the building.

“Set her down here,” he said, moving quickly to her side and calling out, “Collar! Collar? I need you to wake up for me for a minute here.”

She didn’t respond.

He moved to pinch the webbing between her fingers and she groaned, Abigail letting out a breath she hadn’t realized she was holding at the sound feeling as though every moment without Raelle sounding out was one she was slipping away.

“Alright,” he said. “We can work with that.”

There were three soldiers surrounding them, awaiting orders.

“I need two large bore IVs with fluids running immediately. If we have any fucking blood products, we need them ten minutes ago. She’s going to need every red blood cell we can get our hands on.”

Hart and Anderson moved off in pursuit of blood products. The medical team moved to Raelle and began searching her right arm for an IV while another checked her dog tags for blood type and allergies.

Jameson shone a bright light in Raelle’s eyes, then began his assessment at her head working his way down to her feet. He shouted out what he found as a short and stocky man with a pen and paper scrambled to write it all down.

Dr. Jameson was not known for his bedside manner. He was a surgeon through and through. What he lacked in general social tact, he made up for in surgical skill. Raelle had always described him as the foul-mouthed older brother she had never really asked for, but loved having.

“If either of you are queasy, I’d look away now,” he mentioned before taking her shoulder back into place with an audible pop that Abigail felt in her core. He placed his stethoscope on her chest, shaking his head at what he heard before calling out, “I need a chest tube kit.”

Another member of the group ran off in search just as Hart and Anderson returned, blood products in their hands. One of the medical team moved to Raelle’s newly reduced arm to place another IV as another hung the blood products through the first.

“What’s the ETA on med evac?” Jameson asked, tying a bandage around the gushing wound on Raelle’s forehead.

“Thirty minutes,” Anacostia called, startling Abigail who hadn’t noticed her Staff Sergeant standing beside her.

Jameson stopped what he was doing to turn to her in disbelief, “Thirty minutes?”

Anacostia confirmed.

“That’s not going to fucking do. I’ve got no fucking supplies here because everything was in that goddamned building,” he gestured wildly over his shoulder, “and you’re telling me the closest chopper is thirty minutes out?” He seethed, frustration over the situation leaking into his words.

“The one medical chopper on base didn’t survive that explosion, the other is down for repairs and the third was transporting a patient. They’re the first that can be back and are thirty minutes out.”

He looked Anacostia in the eye, “She’s not going to make it thirty minutes, Staff Sergeant.”

Abigail couldn’t hold back the bile any longer and turned to the side away from Anacostia and expelled the contents of her stomach onto the ground.

_We found her and for what? For her to die out here because help is too far away?_

Abigail spit the foul taste from her mouth before straightening back up. She felt a hand on her back and looked up to see Tally who was frowning down at the sight of Jameson working on their best friend.

“You’re certain she won’t make it until the med evac, Dr. Jameson?” Anacostia clarified.

He softened slightly, shaking his head in reply.

She watched Anacostia stiffen and her brow furrow as though she were deciding something. She then nodded to herself and her brow relaxed before calling to Jameson, “Get her stabilized the best that you can, I’ll work on a different extraction.”

_How had it come to this?_

Abigail felt like she was being punished for something she must have done in a past life.

_It’s not supposed to be like this._

The three of them were supposed to leave the way they had served, together and alive. Raelle’s new position as trauma surgeon was supposed to protect her, not put her more in harm’s way.

“Come on, Rae,” she watched as Tally kneeled next to the girl, finding her hand and staying out of the medical team’s way. Abi stayed frozen where she stood until she heard the noise of a large group crunching on the sand.

Anacostia was returning and she wasn’t alone. She was flanked by five or six individuals in civilian clothes. Abigail immediately recognized them as Spree, catching sight of a familiar brunette in the group.

“What the hell is she doing here?” Abigail bit out as she walked to intercept them before they got to Raelle.

“She’s here because I granted them access, Bellweather,” Anacostia stated, calmly and coolly as Abigail stared Scylla down. Anacostia spoke past her, “Dr. Jameson, the Spree have the supplies and a facility we can use for surgery that can be prepped by the time you get there.”

“Then what the hell are we still doing here?” Jameson cut out, gruffly as he motioned for people to begin packing up.

Abigail stood her ground, eyes narrowed at Scylla Ramshorn who didn’t back down from the challenge.

“We can keep up this pointless pissing contest indefinitely or we can get Raelle into the back of a truck and have Jameson operating in the next ten minutes,” Scylla’s words were cold, lacking any of the normal playfulness most of the soldiers had come to expect. “Your call, Bellweather.”

Abigail gritted her teeth, unblinking before finally taking half a step to the side. The group moved around her to help lift Raelle and started walking towards the gate with Dr. Jameson right beside her.

“I swear to goddess, Ramshorn, if you so much as – “

Abigail turned on the Spree agent who squared her shoulders and cut in, “I wouldn’t take her if it weren’t the best option. You don’t have to believe anything I say, but you should believe that.”

There was a brief, tense silence. Then, “We need updates as soon as you have them.”

Scylla held her hand out and the man beside her placed a radio in it. She turned it on and tossed it to Abigail who caught it. “Channel 7.”

She then made to leave, stopping at the quiet, “wait.”

“Please, take care of her,” Abigail’s voice lacked any of the earlier contempt. It was quiet and Scylla felt her heart ache with the emotion she knew Abigail was feeling too.

She gave an earnest nod, crisp, before following the Spree contingent over to the fleet of Spree vehicles outside the base’s entrance. One of the trucks there held the fragile body of a surgeon she loved and was no longer entirely certain loved her back.

Scylla felt the questioning glance of Byron as she settled into the passenger side of one of the transports. She kept her face forward, looking, but not seeing. Her back was straight as she sat tall, the quiver in her chin the only tell that she was entirely falling apart.

*****

_Raelle hiked her bag higher on her shoulders as she made her way into the village. It was the end of her second week and she finally had a day off. The base, more commonly referred to as Fort Salem by the soldiers who called it their home, was on the outskirts of a desert village._

_It had never been built as a permanent structure which was a testament of kinds to the quality, read as complete shit, of the building infrastructure. The semi-permanent base had shifted into somewhat of a bastion for the US Army when things had escalated against the Camarilla in the past four years and minimal efforts had been made to upgrade the buildings to reflect this._

_The relationship between the people in the village and the US Army was civil, for the most part, the Army doing their best to make certain the village’s economy benefitted from their foreign presence. There was every encouragement for soldiers to make their way off base when they could and purchase from the markets and business owners there in addition to the outright payments coming from the US for the land they now occupied. The base location had proven important given its proximity to Camarilla interference both in Asia and the Middle East._

_Fort Salem, and thus the village it was built next to, was going to be Raelle’s home for at least the next year as she studied under Dr. L’Amara and other senior trauma surgeons. They were warzone adjacent in this location. The medical building served as an intermediary housing those wounded in other locations until they were stable enough to recover at Fort Salem or be shipped out to a larger hospital for a higher and continued level of care._

_Initially, there had been concerns that the US presence would lead to more danger for the village, however, this had not yet played out to fruition. It was a fact all of those on base were thankful for. It also made the overnight patrols somewhat of a boring affair, or so Abigail and Tally had informed her on one of their marathon long video chats while she was finishing up her schooling._

_Abigail was from a long line of Army Bellweathers. Her mom was still in and high ranking enough for a double take when any of the commanding officers in basic asked her name. She had been reeling for an opportunity to escape the pressure and stares and expectations that seemed to go hand in hand with her last name. She wanted to make a name for herself and had been lucky enough to be placed in a squad with two women who couldn’t care less about the status of her last name. If anything, the three had gotten off to a rocky start because of it._

_The sometimes-overwhelming drive and touch of arrogance were a combination that didn’t endear Abigail to Raelle. It took months of being forced to work together and Tally working as a middle man for some sort of an agreement to result. They had all enlisted for different reasons and it was the reasons that had initially pushed them apart that eventually became what brought them together._

_In the end, Raelle had ended up with a new family, with sisters and a Sergeant that she maybe accidentally had called mom once when they were caught sneaking back into their barracks after a night of drinking. That same Sergeant had been the reason Abigail and Tally requested assignment at Fort Salem. Anacostia Quartermaine was tough and had expectations higher than most. She also cared, no matter how much she would deny it. The Bellweather unit, as they had been dubbed back in basic, was both the bane of her existence and the reason she reupped when the time came._

_Fort Salem was a place for Abigail to make a name for herself. It was a place for Tally to escape from her overbearing mother and Gerit and his new fiancé. For Raelle, it was a place for her to start practicing medicine, something that made her feel closer to her mom than anything else in the world. For all three, it was a place for them to serve and protect alongside one another._

_Tally and Abigail had done their fair share of exploring in the months leading up to Raelle’s assignment. The plan had originally been for all three to venture out today until Abigail and Tally were forced into gate duty by their Staff Sergeant for “forgetting” to assign themselves to dish duty for the past couple of months._

_“For the record, that wasn’t my idea. I find dishwashing relaxing,” Tally had made clear at breakfast that morning as she put butter on a piece of toast. She had the sense to have not brought this up when Anacostia had been by to unceremoniously inform them in front of half the base._

_Abigail raised an eyebrow, “I didn’t see you complaining when you were spending those nights that we would’ve been elbow deep in suds with that British SAS Lieutenant with the biceps you said could, and I quote, curl mountains if given the chance.”_

_Which, of course, had served Abigail’s purpose of changing the subject given Tally had left out that little detail in all her past catch ups with Raelle._

_Gate guard was normally reserved for new recruits. They would be getting a vacation from the Saturday duty until Anacostia deemed the two Sergeants had learned their lesson._

_After breakfast, they went back to their room. There, Raelle changed into civilian clothes while Tally and Abigail geared up. Because they were sergeants, they were no longer forced to share a room with three other soldiers. Abigail had only given Raelle the requisite amount of grief when they let her move a bed into their room when she had arrived._

_Tally was telling Raelle about the most delicious shawarma she had the last time they had been out as they walked toward the gate. When they reached it, they said goodbye and for the first time since she had arrived, Raelle was on her own._

_She marveled at the color of the village. It was only a brief walk to be truly within village and there was plenty of foot traffic for her to blend into immediately. Everything seemed to be splashed with bold and rich colors. Most of the buildings had a similar neutral tone to them and acted as a blank canvas for local artists to paint incredible murals. It was a startling contrast of life to the desert that surrounded the village._

_It was currently bustling with Saturday activity. People of all ages flooded the streets, some carrying goods to trade at the local market. Others were herding their children along._

_A soccer ball bounced into her path and she stopped at the sight of it. Following its trajectory, she found an alley with a group of kids, probably in their preteens standing sheepishly there. There was some argument between them and then one was pushed forward and walked cautiously out to her._

_She flicked it up into hands with her foot before holding it out for the boy. He reached out shyly grabbing it from her hands and sprinting back towards his friends who all called in thanks to her. She waved back, a smile on her face._

_“I’d be careful with them, they’ll have you playing in no time and there is absolutely no respect for elders on that pitch,” an unfamiliar voice warned, drawing Raelle’s attention._

_She turned and found a brunette, a casual slouch to her shoulders from where she was leaning her back against a wall with one leg propped up against it with her hands in her pockets._

_“Speaking from experience?”_

_Scylla pushed off the wall, keeping her hands in her pockets as she shrugged, “Well, one can only get nutmegged so many times before their ego never recovers.”_

_Raelle took in the cocky smirk as she looked the woman up and down, “You seem to be doing okay.”_

_“I’m glad you think so, it’s taken months of therapy and actual metric tons of baklava for me to get to this point.”_

_“Glad, I could see it. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have somewhere to be.” Raelle gave a wave and started walking again. The brunette had been more attractive in person than paper and Raelle had immediately regretted all the thoughts that had brought to mind. She was a mercenary. Nothing more to say._

_Scylla frowned at the dismissal, stunned for a moment before jogging to catch up to the blonde._

_Raelle sighed when she noted the brunette beside her. She felt eyes on her and chose to keep looking straight ahead. She couldn’t have been clearer she wasn’t interested in a conversation. Yet here the brunette was, walking casually on her right._

_“Did you need something?” She finally asked, an edge of impatience to the words._

_Scylla grinned, “It’s a beautiful day. Can’t help it if I want to spend it with a beautiful woman, can I?”_

_Raelle felt her cheeks color slightly at the compliment and scolded herself for the reaction. She couldn’t tell if there was anything genuine there or if she was simply riling her up._

_She needed to stop whatever this was in its tracks._

_“I know who you are.”_

_“My reputation precedes me.” Scylla’s eyes widened in mock surprise. She tilted her head to the side with her lips still firmly in a smirk that Raelle wanted very much to not find attractive. “Only good things, I hope?”_

_“Not exactly. Scylla Ramshorn, Spree intelligence officer.”_

_She removed her hands from her pockets to raise them in front of her in mock surrender, “You got me. Now, tell me, is that all you know about me?”_

_The surgeon shook her head as the two continued into the village, “What else is there to know?”_

_Scylla’s hands slid back into her pockets, “You know it’s always Spree agent this, Spree intelligence officer that. No one ever leads with the fact that I speak four languages or that I’m a loud sneezer.”_

_“You’re also bad at soccer.”_

_“Ouch, didn’t we cover the fact that my ego is still fragile? I should have never divulged such important intel so early into our relationship.”_

_“Relationship? Getting a little ahead of yourself, aren’t you?”_

_“I think this would all be easier if you admitted you’re attracted to me. You know I’m attracted to you. We’re both young, attractive women. The story practically writes itself.”_

_Raelle could have laughed at the directness of the Spree agent. She hadn’t met someone that was so forward in a setting like this. She doubted the brunette had tagged her as anything but military when she first saw her and yet here she was, flirting out in the open and expecting Raelle, to what? Flirt back?_

_It didn’t matter that Scylla was pushing all the buttons that would have garnered her full interest given any other circumstance. She was Spree. Raelle wasn't letting herself drift into any of that._

_“And if I don’t want to be in whatever story you’re writing?”_

_Scylla paused, considering this a moment before, “Maybe you don’t. But thinking you know me since you know who pays my bills is a little,” she searched for the word, “short-sighted.”_

_Raelle scoffed, stopping abruptly. “Short-sighted? Really. Did you ever think that maybe it wasn’t just about who pays your bills? Maybe I’m just not interested.”_

_Scylla took measured steps closer until there was practically no distance between them. Raelle could feel the heat off her body, could smell the sweat and desert dirt kicked on her skin. There was an electricity in the air as Scylla raised an eyebrow in challenge, her eyes flicking across Raelle’s features. After a moment, she stepped back with a shrug. “Nah, that’s not it.” She began to walk again._

_Raelle huffed and, despite herself, followed her._

_Seeing she had caught up, Scylla continued, “You’re making a judgement about me without actually knowing me.”_

_“You’re telling me you’re attracted to me without actually knowing me,” Raelle countered._

_“Well, therapy didn’t just help me through the soccer incident, it also helped me express myself more openly.”_

_“So, you’re openly a mercenary?”_

_“I’m not a mercenary,” she replied, lightly._

_“No?”_

_“I’m a humanitarian with resources.”_

_Raelle barked out a sardonic laugh. “A humanitarian with resources?” She repeated incredulously, “That’s rich. Tell yourself whatever you need to sleep at night.”_

_“And how exactly do you sleep at night then?”_

_“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”_

_“It means that US Army, Spree,” she had her hands raised at her side, palms to the sky as though she were balancing something upon them. She moved each one up and down. “Different names, a lot of the same.”_

_Raelle bristled at the implication. “The US Army is **not** the Spree.” _

_“No, you’re right.” The blonde exhaled. Finally, they were getting somewhere, “The US Army is responsible for significantly more needless deaths.”_

_Her eyes popped wide at the notion. “That is… I can’t…” She grappled for words. “You – “_

_“Take your time,” Scylla said, a playful condescension on the words._

_Raelle was seeing red. Where the hell did this woman get off saying what she was saying? She continued to stutter for a moment before cutting back, “Is this really your idea of flirting?”_

_Scylla shrugged, a maddening smile on her lips. “Didn’t seem like my humble bragging about being multilingual and sneezing loudly was cutting it.”_

_“So, you brought out the big guns?”_

_“Technically more of a knife person, although I have been known to regularly carry a pistol given the number of people who have tried to shoot me has gone up exponentially compared to my last job as a barista.”_

_“You are…”_

_“Charming? Stunningly pretty? Someone you very much want to go on a date with?”_

_“I was going to say infuriating.”_

_“Ah, well. All the same really, at least you’re thinking about me.”_

_Raelle blinked. “I should be,” she waved a hand behind her, “going. I really should be going. Alone.” She added, realizing how poorly her ending the conversation had gone before._

_“Of course, soldier, or should I be saying ma’am or Sergeant or Captain or…?” She trailed off, intentionally leaving a blank for the surgeon to fill._

_Raelle paused briefly, realizing through all of this, she had never actually given her name. She smiled internally, feeling as though she finally had something over the woman beside her._

_“Aren’t you an intelligence officer?” She replied. “I think you can figure it out.”_

_She didn’t linger after the statement, instead starting a near break neck pace as she walked away._

_Scylla let her go this time, standing in the middle of the path as people filtered around her and shouted after her, without any regard to who heard, “Next time, then! We could get something to eat then maybe get to know each other, clothing optional, yeah?”_

_Several members of the crowd shot looks of judgement at the brunette for the statement that she artfully ignored._

_Scylla smiled to herself until the blonde was nothing but another small dot in the crowd of people around her. Dr. Raelle Collar had been nothing more than a file on her desk for the past week. She never had expected the file to materialize into the feisty and strikingly beautiful blonde. Sometimes work wasn’t so bad after all._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Creative licensing grants me the ability to give Raelle Collar a medical degree in an incredibly abbreviated time and not actually make her do any residency or fellowship as is the truth behind a real trauma surgeon. Thank you for living up the inaccuracy of that timeline. Thank you so much for all of the feedback on the first chapter! I loved every bit of it. Would love to hear predictions, favorite parts on this one. Thanks for reading!


	3. Heaviness and the weight that comes with it

Chapter 3

When you think about the end of your life, do you perseverate on the details? Diving into the finest of details that paint each moment, second by second until the end? Or do you think about the events that led you there, pulling your focus from the details onto the surrounding big picture?

Raelle Collar had never considered how her life would end. There were moments, back when she was drowning in the recklessness that only grief can create that she considered how the act of enlisting and being deployed to the front lines would accelerate her path to a young death.

It wasn’t until she navigated further from her mother’s death that she reconsidered. The full gravity of her mother’s death and all of its repercussions made enlisting all that more difficult of a decision to make. It wasn’t as though she had all that many choices to begin with.

She could have stayed in North Carolina, stayed in the city her dad had always called home and she had grown up in. Maybe she could have even gone to trade school like he had to become a mechanic. She could see that whole life out ahead of her and she didn’t care for it.

She couldn’t see herself meeting a partner in her small, Baptist-predominant town where her attraction to women was branded immediately either a novelty or sin. She would be alone, much like her father who had pushed everyone who cared about him away slowly and then all at once.

They didn’t have the money for her to go to college. All of the financial support from the army had long since dried up before she even had time to consider it. They didn’t even have the credit for her to qualify for a student loan given her dad would have to be the cosigner and he had unfortunately defaulted on a number of loans in the past because of his tendency to sink every paycheck into booze or gambling.

She remembers the army recruiter at her school and the raw anger she felt at his presence. She knew how willing they were to take advantage of kids just like her, kids who lacked any other way out. She hated that she needed the army to “save” her. And for all of his faults, she loved her dad. His alcohol use was a disease, just like any other. She knew that, had read all the books about it in high school when the library was a safer haven than her own home.

Part of her reasoning, whether she knew it at the time or not, for going to medical school had been trying to fix her family. “Fix,” of course, had been an impossible and unreasonable task. There was no way to fix another person, not really. But she had learned more about addiction and mental health and the interconnectedness of the two. It didn’t help her fix her dad, but it did help her understand him more.

He had never been violent or said anything unkind to her while intoxicated. More times than not what he would say would just make her incredibly sad. She had lost count of the number of times she had to bail him out of the drunk tank at the sheriff’s station, where the police had started taking pity on the man and rarely gave him any citations. He was a loving and caring man who felt too much and there was a part of her that hated him for it because it made her feel like she wasn't allowed to. If he was emotional, she had to be logical enough for the both of them.

So, she learned how to compartmentalize. When her emotions became too much, she would take them and shove them deep down inside of herself until an unspecified time later when she had the bandwidth to reopen and process them. And if those times were far and few in between, it was for the best, she reasoned. She had to keep a clear head.

She had become an expert at restraining her every emotion by the time she had reluctantly filled out the paperwork for the army recruiter. She etched every emotion that flew across her dad’s face when she told him later that night on a stone that she filed away deep within for another time. She pretended she didn’t smell the whiskey on his breath with more regularity until she left. It wasn’t something she could process, so why should she have to try? Especially when he had seemed to give up trying so long ago.

If you had asked Raelle Collar what the end of her life would look like, she might give you a thoughtful glance before stowing the question away for another time. Not yet, she might say. She might even smile back and tell you how it would be when she was gray and old with Abigail and Tally by her side.

She had never imagined it would be so sudden and so painful. Death, she had thought, was meant to be some great emptiness. How could pain exist in a great emptiness?

Yet, here she was, dead, and in the worst pain she had ever experienced. She was overwhelmed by even the thought of it, by the thought of anything for that matter. It was almost as though every emotion she had ever packed away was escaping one after another from her very core.

With them, there were voices, scattered and distant murmurings that seemed just beyond her hearing range. There was also a faint beeping in the background that seemed to be increasing as her awareness did. Then, a cool feeling would extend from her arm and trace towards her chest before awareness would become gradually less and less until she was left with a heaviness instead.

It thudded to the center of her chest. She felt like someone had tied an anchor to each limb and placed one on top of her. Was this meant to keep her from floating? Surely, since she was dead, she should have been allowed to float.

Time was an odd concept in the afterlife, it seemed to flow faster and slower of its own accord. She had no way to track it. The awareness would increase periodically before more cool flowed from her arm to bring back the blessed heaviness. She reveled in the heaviness at times. Awareness only seemed to bring more pain with it, the heaviness blissfully stole that away.

She thought about what would be happening back on base as they found her body. She hoped Tally and Abigail hadn’t seen her in the state she was in after the explosion. She hoped Anacostia was the one to tell them what had happened to her as she knew the stoic woman would be the only one who would be able to communicate the harsh news in a way that wouldn’t make all of it worse than it was.

She thought of her dad and wondered if they had called or sent someone in person to deliver the news. She wondered if he had been sober enough to answer the phone if they called. It would be his worst fear actualized learning that she had been killed in action, the same as his wife. A nightmare repeating itself, a fresh hell bubbling over anew again.

She thought of Scylla and how information always seemed to trickle over to the Spree from Fort Salem in one form or another. She couldn’t see any way the explosion hadn’t been loud enough to wake the village and with it the Spree from their location within it. She wondered if they had sent trucks over to investigate or if they sat knowingly in their own beds, the intelligence of the planning of the attack already having crossed their airwaves some hours or even days before. Her thoughts soured and she burned with anger at the organization that had taken so much from her.

 _I’m exhausted,_ she realized with a start. It hardly made any sense. Maybe she would just feel tired for the next millennia before finally beginning to feel rested. This was, after all, the first time she had died. She didn’t have much experience to work with on the subject matter.

She had grown bored of the darkness after some time and despite her best efforts, had been unable to force her heavy eyelids up to see if there was anything beyond them. It was all very odd. She hadn’t spent all that much time considering what death would be like, but she certainly never had thought she would still be in her body or any body for that matter. There was a chance that she wasn’t, of course, she couldn’t dispute that fact without getting her eyes open first.

She pondered the utility of it all. If she had a millennium to rest, did she really need to force her eyes open now? Would opening them somehow speed any of this up? Maybe it would dampen the pain quicker. She had no way to prove any of this.

She was, however, a scientist at her heart. She had a hypothesis, granted it was more based in hopefulness than any fact, she figured the afterlife couldn’t fault her given the paucity of resources currently at her disposal. With great effort, she focused all of her energy on opening her eyes. She noticed that it was the nearest an impossible task the more heaviness she felt.

When her awareness and the pain that came with it began to increase again, she doubled her efforts. Despite them, this, unfortunately, only meant her right eyelid twitched slightly. The left felt entirely immobile, trapped in some soft casing of its own devices.

It felt like years before she finally was able to force her right eye open a millimeter. It slammed shut and she frowned internally at the lack of progress. She pushed again and this time fought to maybe a quarter of the way open. Nothing into focus with it.

It hadn’t been as pure dark as she had expected though. It wasn’t the kind of black nothingness she might have anticipated.

It was another unmeasurable amount of time before she worked up the strength to open it again, this time halfway before it again slid shut.

She paused and then pushed and this time she was able to open the eye entirely. Her mind scrambled as it tried to piece together the images in front of her, but they were all blurred. It closed and was some time before she could press it open, the images slightly more in focus this time.

There was a ceiling? It looked like a ceiling with one of those fluorescent lights that Tally always complained made her look translucent in photographs. It was thankfully off so she wasn’t forced to look directly into it. She struggled against the weight of her eyelid before it slid shut again.

The beeping was still there, in the background. Steady.

_Beep._

Raelle forced her eye back up at the light.

_Beep._

She wished someone would turn the beeping off. What an annoying feature of eternity that she couldn’t control the lighting and sound.

_Beep._

She looked down and noticed something out of the corner of her eye.

_Was that a breathing tube?_

_Beep._

_Goddess, why do I need a breathing tube if I’m dead?_

_Beep._

She nearly rolled her eyes at the thought. What a dumb thing for her subconscious to conjure.

_Beep._

The sound of something shifting beside her. A weight on her right hand growing infinitesimally. 

_Beep._

She tried to sweep to the side to look at whatever had caused the noise. Her eye swung sluggishly in that direction and she felt her head spin with the motion.

_Beep._

She squinted, trying to bring the world into focus and failing. All she could see was the outline of a shadowed figure sitting next to her.

 _Now, this,_ she thought, _made sense._

It was only an outline, but she recognized the shape of it. Of course, she would be here. No matter how angry Raelle had been, no matter how wrecked she had been at the events in the month leading up to the explosion, Scylla being here was one thing that made perfect sense.

_Beep._

It was the first thing she hadn’t had to question about death. She had difficulty concentrating on anything beyond that and closed her eye again. Her mind felt fragmented in a way it never had before.

She almost felt as though she were dreaming. It wasn’t a very good dream, but a dream nonetheless. She wondered if this was it, if she was doomed to spend an eternity in this place with that infernal beeping in the background, the outline or Scylla Ramshorn’s immobile and silent body next to her and shrouded in darkness.

How she wished she could go back to a time before all of this, before any of this happened. Before the pain and the heaviness, before it all ended. If she had more time, she knew she could do _something_ , anything with it. She just needed more time.

A chill flooded from her arm and more heaviness pressed upon her before she was drifting again, feeling like her body was dancing to music she couldn’t hear.

*****

_“I’m not going,” Raelle proclaimed, flopping moodily onto her cot and glaring at the ceiling, “And that’s that.”_

_Tally and Abigail shared a glance at the dramatic display, Abigail rolling her eyes as she sorted through the pile of seemingly endless dresses on Tally’s bed._

_“You’re going,” Abigail replied firmly._

_Raelle scoffed and threw an arm over her eyes. “I am not.”_

_“Stop being a child, you’re going.”_

_“Nope.”_

_“Yes—“_

_“No – ”_

_Tally, who had been silent as the two continued to bicker moved over to sit calmly beside Raelle. Raelle slid her arm down at the bounce of the cot beside her to peer one eye at Tally who was giving her a knowing look._

_“Okay,” She dropped her arm back down at her side, “Explain to me how we, the US Army, infiltrating some village festival is going to paint us in any light other than barbaric,” the surgeon tried to reason as she spoke with her hands._

_“We aren’t infiltrating anything, we were invited,” Abigail held up a purple dress to her form, moving to the mirror and twirling, a trace of a smile on her lips as she did so._

_Raelle grunted, opening her mouth to argue when Tally jumped in, “Rae, it’s Beltane. This is a big deal for this village and yes, being a foreign military presence within it doesn’t make us top on the invite list. But the local leadership invited us and because of our rank, we actually get to go.”_

_Tally had been practically vibrating with excitement since it was first announced. She had immediately gone back and called her mom who had sent over an insane amount of dresses of varying styles for the girls to sort through. The shipping must have cost her an arm and a leg. Tally was giving first choice to her two friends before opening up the selections to the rest of the women on base._

_“You’re just saying that because you want to get dressed up,” Raelle heard and couldn’t stop the whine in her voice._

_“Do I want to get dressed up and maybe flirt with some of the locals? I mean, yeah, Rae, I do.” Tally had an eyebrow arched at her as she stood and made her way to the heap of dresses on her cot, “But I also can appreciate local tradition and Beltane is part of their tradition and respecting it is a sign and show of respect for the village.”_

_“Don’t let her fool you, Tal, the only reason she’s all worked up about this is because a certain member of the Spree has been magically appearing everywhere she is to try and ask her to it.”_

_Raelle rolled her eyes at the mention of it, thinking back to how she had to deftly and sometimes not as deftly dodge the brunette all of the last week. One time involved going out of a window that was slightly higher than she originally anticipated. She wasn’t even sure how the brunette got on the base half the time. She had thought base would be the one place she could let her guard down and, instead, there she was diving out a window and landing unceremoniously in a heap on the hard ground with an oomph. As she went to stand and brush herself off, she took a brief glance to see if anyone had noticed her abrupt arrival and grimaced as she saw her staff sergeant standing in front of her with a questioning glance on her face._

_Anacostia tilted her head, raised her eyebrows, then shook her head, “Not gonna ask, Collar, not gonna ask,” and walked away._

_Probably could have been worse, Raelle had thought._

_“Why have you been putting so much effort into avoiding her?” Tally asked, genuine interest on her face as she began to sort through the dresses in front of her, holding out a green floor length gown for Abigail to try. “It’s not like her asking you to Beltane is all that different from asking you out every other time.”_

_Raelle had spent a lot of time trying to convince herself of the same thing. Why was she having such a reaction to the idea of turning Scylla down to an event she didn’t even want to go to in the first place?_

_She knew the answer and had known it for the past week. She was dreading acknowledging it and felt procrastination might be the best solution to that so she had been intentionally flighty any time she so much as saw what she thought could have been the outline of the Spree intelligence officer._

_The issue was, Raelle didn’t want to turn her down. Not for this event. She hadn’t allowed herself to imagine what it would be like to dance with the brunette or even wonder what she might pick out to wear. It hadn’t been easy to push those thoughts aside, either. She wasn’t a fool. She knew there were curves hiding beneath the utilitarian and neutral wardrobe the woman wore to blend as most of the military contractors decided to do. She also knew that actually laying eyes on those curves might weaken her resolve to a level she couldn’t allow._

_She was a mercenary and Raelle didn’t date mercenaries._

_Even ones with incredible blue eyes that seemed to look right through her._

_Nope, Raelle didn’t date mercenaries._

_She hated that she had to keep reminding herself of the fact._

_This would all be so much simpler if she were allowed to pick up a call shift at the medical building. It was something that Dr. L’Amara had quickly vetoed, telling her she was too young to miss a night at Beltane. She had tried arguing that Dr. L’Amara should have the time to relax instead, but that had been dismissed easily as the senior attending told her about the last few years at the festival and how it was her turn to let the younger surgeons attend. It wasn’t open for discussion._

_Raelle sighed, thinking of all the firework injuries she could be treating instead of spending the whole night trying expertly to avoid a certain mercenary._

_The door to their room opened saving Raelle from answering Tally’s question and Staff Sergeant Quartermaine popped her head in causing the three to jump to attention, the green dress Abigail had been holding up falling to the ground._

_“At ease, soldiers,” Anacostia uttered and the three relaxed. “Dr. Collar, Dr. L’Amara has requested your presence at medical.”_

_Raelle nearly smiled at the excuse to escape the conversation as she nodded at the staff sergeant and made her way out the door firmly ignoring the imploring looks of both Tally and Abigail that followed her and were practically shouting that the conversation wasn’t over. That would be a problem for her future self to deal with._

_She nearly skipped her way out of the barracks, throwing the doors open to the sweltering heat and blistering midday sun. The spring in her step felt good after a week of subterfuge. Maybe things were changing to go her way for once. She could almost taste the change in her luck._

_She nodded at various people as she walked past them on base._

_Raelle genuinely loved her job. Growing up, she had never imagined she would feel excited at the prospect of learning more each and every day. She never thought she would find something that she was passionate about. Where she was from, people didn't work jobs because they loved them, they worked them to put food on the table and pay for a roof over their family's head. Experiencing the excitement of each new day had been a shock to her at first. Medicine was it for her. It was something she felt she was meant to do. It grounded her, kept her humble in so many ways. She felt the weight of responsibility of each patient she had the privilege to treat. She couldn’t imagine going back to being infantry with Tally and Abigail. The thought of losing her purpose brought a chill up her spine._

_Dr. L’Amara had been an incredible mentor. She was always willing to teach, always pushing Raelle beyond her comfort zone in a way that didn’t feel like she was abandoning her. The older woman was a role model for the blonde surgeon. She dreamed of her career following a similar trajectory and brightened at the thought of being the one teaching someone like herself someday in the future. She knew that not every surgeon was lucky enough to have someone like Dr. L’Amara in their lives._

_Raelle found herself envisioning each step of a new surgical technique Dr. L’Amara had been teaching her as she walked. Her hands began to move in front of her as the movements floated through her mind. She’d like to blame her focus on her craft for her momentary lapse of awareness of her surroundings._

_If she had been paying attention, she might have noted the Spree trucks located just outside the gate as she pushed open the door to medical. She also might have recognized the unfamiliar faces of men in civilian clothes just inside the doors. Maybe if she had been paying attention, she might’ve been able to prepare herself._

_Instead, when she opened the door to Dr. L’Amara’s shared office and saw the brunette she had dedicated the better part of the week avoiding sitting in a chair across the metal desk from her mentor with an almost irritatingly innocent smile on her face, she startled, “Motherfucking shitbags.”_

_The words flowed from her mouth without her permission. There was a man sitting next to Scylla and the sound of him trying to stifle a laugh, failing and forcing it into a cough filled the room as Dr. L’Amara gave Raelle a curious look._

_“I apologize for Dr. Collar, she seems to have forgotten her manners somewhere in the OR,” Dr. L’Amara spoke in a matter of fact manner and Raelle broke free from her seemingly frozen position at the door and went to stand beside the older surgeon._

_“No need to apologize, Dr. L’Amara,” Scylla said with amusement written plainly in her voice. “It’s clear that Dr. Collar’s creativity hasn’t been forgotten there as well.”_

_The man beside her chuckled slightly before adopting a neutral face._

_“Well, now that the ice has been broke, so to speak, Dr. Collar I want you to meet Scylla Ramshorn and Byron Rostam. They are, as you’ve probably surmised, members of Spree Security.”_

_Raelle nodded at her mentor as she stood rigidly beside her. She was wondering how exactly Scylla had weaseled her way into the attending’s office. What excuse had she used?_

_“You’re probably wondering why we’re here,” Scylla cut in and Raelle hated that she seemed to read her so easily. Another nod and a refusal to look up from the metal desk in front of her._

_“There is a group of nomadic desert people called the Tarim who have made camp nearby,” Byron spoke as he lifted a folder to her before holding it out. She took it and began to flip through the pages of photographs. People of all ages greeted her. Some photos were clearly taken from a surveillance distance away and others much closer. “We received a tip from someone in the village that a member of the Tarim they had been trading with had mentioned some of their people had been ill recently. They are notoriously wary of outsiders.”_

_Raelle continued to flip through the brief pausing as she came across a photo of a leg, clearly infected and purulent. There was an edge of necrotic tissue to the wound that was spreading over the entire calf of the person. She looked up._

_“Obviously, the photos in your hand tell you we were able to gain enough trust to investigate the claims.”_

_Another photo, rotting flesh on an arm, this time of a girl that couldn’t have been older than twelve. Raelle’s eyebrows furrowed as she found another photo, another infection. She turned over photo after photo of the same._

_Byron continued, “We found countless Tarim with wounds similar to what you’re looking at there. Some of the elders who had come down the infection first have become too ill to continue moving.”_

_“These look necrotizing,” Raelle commented._

_Dr. L’Amara smiled at her, “I said the same thing.”_

_“These wounds need surgical debridement and antibiotics.”_

_“They do.”_

_“We can clear a day and have them come in, have everyone chip in,” Raelle offered, her mind going over the logistics of it all. “If they’re wary of outsiders, they might not be all that interested in general anesthesia, but maybe they’d be okay with nerve blocks or conscious sedation.”_

_“A good thought,” Dr. L’Amara said, “however, the Tarim will not enter the village.”_

_“Tarim tradition prevents them from entering a village to do anything but trade goods,” Byron stated._

_Raelle turned to him, “Surely, tradition could be bent a little to allow their people to be treated?”_

_“They won’t.” Scylla spoke in a soft voice, “We asked and pleaded with them, but they won’t. It was hard enough to gain their trust to even meet with them in the first place.”_

_“So, what does this mean, then?”_

_“They have allowed for us to send a team to them.” Byron supplied. “We will be sending a team tomorrow with antibiotics and medical supplies. With the limited turn around, we do not have all of our medical team available. We only have one doctor and anesthesiologist as well as several nurses.”_

_“How many people have infections like this?” Raelle asked, holding a photo up._

_“At least twenty, maybe more,” Scylla shifted in her seat. “They weren’t forthcoming with the numbers.”_

_Raelle spoke under her breath, setting the folder back onto the desk. “There’s no way one doctor is able to get through twenty infections like this in a single day.”_

_“They won’t have to. In situations like these, the army is more than happy to supply the necessary personnel for such a mission.”_

_Raelle’s eyebrows raised, “Am I to assume that I will be one of those necessary personnel?”_

_“Yes, Dr. Collar,” Dr. L’Amara shot her a look that told her just like Beltane, that there was no way around this._

_And there it was. That had been the request that had gotten Scylla onto base._

_A humanitarian with resources, Scylla’s words from their first meeting echoed in her head._

_“You will be joining a medical team leaving with the Spree in the late evening tomorrow.”_

_Raelle gave a puzzled look, asking, “Why late evening?”_

_Byron explained, “The Tarim leaders don’t want the arrival of support to look like a defeat to their people.”_

_“Which is why you will also be going in civilian clothes instead of uniform. We do not want to look like a threat to the Tarim. We are mitigating risk of that by taking these precautions. There will be a full brief tonight. I had wanted you to see some of the wounds prior to this meeting so you can begin to create some semblance of an operative debridement plan.”_

_“You can keep that folder, if you wish,” Byron offered and slid it back across the desk toward the blonde. She picked it up._

_“1800 tonight, here in medical, Collar,” Dr. L’Amara told her succinctly and Raelle took it for what it was, a dismissal. She made her way out of the medical building, the folder in her hand weighing heavily on her mind. What was the best way to attack such a clearly aggressive infection without amputation? Surely, some of the infections would be past saving the extremities._

_“If I didn’t know any better, I’d say that you’ve been trying to avoid me,” a voice came from over her shoulder and Raelle didn’t bother adjusting her pace._

_“You must think rather highly of yourself if you think I’d put effort into something as juvenile as that,” Raelle haughtily replied and denied the accusation offhandedly despite the knowledge that she had been doing just that all week._

_“So, that wasn’t you jumping out of a window when I came into the rec hall earlier this week?” Her words were light, teasing._

_Eff, Raelle thought she had actually gotten away with that._

_“Because if not, there certainly appears to be someone who looks very similar to you walking around in a uniform on base.”_

_“What do you want, Scylla?” Raelle sighed out, stopping and turning to face the brunette._

_“Can’t a woman say hi to her favorite trauma surgeon on base that she coincidentally is going to be running an op with tomorrow?”_

_Raelle resisted the urge to roll her eyes. Of course, it was Scylla’s operation. It had been her and Byron in Dr. L’Amara’s office. She shouldn't have been surprised by the confirmation, but there was still a part of her that had been hoping for a small miracle._

_Had there actually been a moment before this that she had thought maybe her luck was changing? Crash back to the reality of having to go on a mission with a woman she had been avoiding all week._

_“Not if she doesn’t explain how she talked Dr. L’Amara into sending a team to support the work of a mercenary organization.”_

_“Not a mercenary organization,” Scylla tsked, “And you have a brief full of photos that explain how Dr. L’Amara was persuaded.”_

_Raelle lofted the folder, “And do these pictures explain how you selected your own medical team?”_

_“You think I selected you?”_ _Raelle gave her a look. She smiled in return, “Now who’s thinking highly of themselves?”_

_The blonde huffed, turning to walk away and Scylla gently caught her arm, sparks lighting up the limb at the contact. “We requested the best surgeons they had on base, Dr. L’Amara didn’t hesitate to add your name to that list. I could have requested you personally, but I had a hunch you would be very good at your job and I was right.” Scylla dropped her hand from Raelle’s arm, an uncharacteristic sincerity present in her words before, “I hope you’re realizing I usually am.”_

_And we were back to her normal amount of arrogance, Raelle thought, the sincerity of the previous statement ruined by the latter half of it. “I’ve got surgical plans to make, Ramshorn, I’m assuming you have arrangements of your own to confirm?”_

_Scylla nodded. “I guess I’ll be seeing you at the brief tonight, then, Dr. Collar. Something tells me we are going to make a great team.”_

_Raelle snorted a laugh, waving the folder dismissively in front of her as she walked away and called back over her shoulder, “Yeah, sure. Whatever you say.”_

_Raelle walked quickly, mind already back in her room where her computer and her research awaited her. Maybe she had overreacted to Scylla’s part in all of this. It was a medical mission. Aspects of it represented exactly why she had gone into medicine in the first place. It was an opportunity to help others. It was an opportunity to prove Dr. L’Amara right that she was one of the best surgeons on base. So what if Scylla was going to be there while she did it?_

_At the very least this was an opportunity to continue avoiding Tally and Abigail’s questioning about Beltane. And she didn’t even have to jump out of a window this time. Thank goddess for small graces._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! I would love to hear any and all thoughts, predictions, favorite parts. I know this is slow building in a lot of ways. Obviously, plot is starting to form up a bit more. I’d apologize for the delay in posting, but frankly, work gets to sort my writing schedule so I’ll do my best to update when I can.


	4. The way out is in

Chapter 4

Scylla Ramshorn had never felt more claustrophobic. She focused hard on controlling her breathing.

_Five counts in, hold one… two, six counts out._

_Repeat._

It took her a moment to identify the feeling coursing through her veins. It was anxiety, pure and unfiltered. Her leg bounced beneath her as the energy spilled over.

_Five counts in, hold one… two, six counts out._

_Repeat._

She hadn’t felt this way in years. Not since those first few months after her parents had been killed when the only piece that was guaranteed each day was more uncertainty. It was in that breadth of uncertainty that she had first been recruited by the Spree. There had been no delusions of grandeur, just the promise of a roof over her head and two to three meals a day. It was enough, in the beginning.

She hadn’t known anything about the Spree at the time. She had been living in shelters in town and there was word of a new one opening that would be offering multiple nights’ stay for people that were willing to work. There were a variety of jobs to be completed, many taking place within the shelter and involving cleaning and cooking that many of the women chose to do.

Scylla preferred the long and often harsh days spent working the fields. After breakfast, a van would pick the group up and drive them just out of town. A quick bag lunch around noon then work until dinner. The physical toll of each day was just enough to push her into a dreamless sleep each night. Her hands were blistered and sore until they became calloused and tough.

The work was too much for some of the others. They had other jobs to go to during the day or had children that needed looking after that they made it impossible for them to work in the designated roles. There was a quick turnover because of it.

There were a few regulars that would nod in acknowledgement as they saw her in the van in the morning and then there were some constants, employees of some kind. They remained on the periphery, supervising all of those working, distributing food, and stepping in if there were any disputes in the shelter.

Scylla quietly went about her work, ate her meals to herself, and slept in a communal room only to wake up and do it all over again. There was some peace in the structure of it all, yet she never felt settled. She had felt on edge since her parents’ deaths and was vigilant in a way she hadn’t anticipated.

It might have been some form of PTSD when she reflected back on it. Paranoia was a common thread in the shelters and for good reason. Scylla had learned the lesson the hard way her first night in another shelter when her bag had been ransacked when she left it out to use the restroom in the middle of the night. Being alone made vigilance a necessity. If there was no one else to watch your back, you had to watch it for yourself.

She amused herself learning details of the lives of those that filtered in and out of the shelter. No one ever spoke directly to her. If they did, she would mumble something in Swedish and make it seem as though she didn’t understand what they were saying. She did, of course, but she preferred that was knowledge she and no one else had for the time being.

She learned that one of the men had been kicked out of his home after his wife found him cheating. Another man was using the shelter just until he could find another place. One of the girls was newly pregnant and terrified to tell her parents so she had run away. Another one of the regulars that worked the field with her was a widower who had turned to alcohol when he had lost his wife.

She wasn’t sure if people talked around her because they didn’t think she understood or if they simply didn’t care. Regardless, she was there, listening more times than not and compiling information that didn’t exactly have a purpose. It gave her something to do until the day she overheard something she knew wasn’t meant for her ears.

She had been sitting in the van, her head resting against the window as the morning sun filtered through its windows. She was staring aimlessly out the window and waiting for the others to finish their breakfasts and join her. It had been a hot week and Scylla was feeling the weight of exhaustion from working all week in the heat.

There were two men in the van a couple of rows in front of where she sat. One began to speak in Arabic, the other quickly silencing him and nodding in Scylla’s direction. The first man had a perpendicular scar on the right side of his face. Scylla had noticed it at breakfast yesterday. It looked threatening, he looked threatening.

The second man had scoffed audibly and dismissively replied, “she doesn’t understand a word we are saying. Do you, girl?” To which Scylla remained still and silent, her gaze purposefully unfocused.

Scylla’s interest and ire were gained by the comment. The man with the scar then asked the other if he wanted to make extra money and offered him a position. He knew of a group that helps transport… and then there was a word that Scylla couldn’t place, some slang term she hadn’t came across before. The two quieted as another man stepped into the van and made no further mention of it during their commute or that day in the fields.

Unlike any of the other information she had come across, there was something about this that felt different. She had an odd feeling that couldn’t be entirely explained by her dislike of being underestimated.

Later that night, long after most people had left the dining room, Scylla pushed her food around a plate and sat with her back to a table containing the two men from earlier.

They were joined tonight by a third and fourth man. The man with the scar explained what he had before and then added on the shockingly high amount they could make for a simple transport job. They would need to pass an inspection from a higher member of the operation before they’d be allowed to work. One of the men questioned this for a moment before all of them agreed and they set up a meeting spot.

If Scylla happened to be loitering just inside the door to where the men had chosen to meet at exactly the right time, it was really to their own fault, she reasoned. She had brought a book with her to flip through on the off chance anyone questioned her presence which no one had. She sat on the steps, opening the book to rest on her legs as she perked her ears to the small group of men.

Finally, with added context she was able to give meaning to the slang word she hadn’t been able to place before.

Child trafficking. It had to be. The “goods” they had been discussing as carelessly as though they were replaceable materials were young girls kidnapped from their homes.

Scylla’s blood turned cold at the realization of exactly what had felt wrong about the very first conversation.

What the hell was she supposed to do with this? This wasn’t something she could store away and do nothing with. She couldn’t sit on this like all of the other information she had been accruing over the past month. The problem was there wasn’t anyone she could tell. She had no confidant at the shelter. She doubted the local authorities would give two shits what some white woman had picked up while eavesdropping and on what? A possible child trafficking ring? The credibility of it was something that even Scylla could acknowledge was feeble at best.

In the end, she decided actions were a better option than words. She waited, listened as the men continued to meet until the day the man with the scar mentioned a shipment was coming in. After dinner, she took a knife from the kitchen on her way back to her bedroom. That night, before bed, she dressed in the darkest clothes she had and settled in. She didn’t sleep. She lay there, motionless, and listened for the shifting of several men from their cots around half past midnight.

She waited until the last had made his way outside and followed as quietly as she could. Her heart was pounding, yet she felt steadier than she had in months. She crept behind corners, keeping her distance to not raise suspicion.

In all honesty, she hadn’t had much of a plan. Somehow, she still felt confident. This was the right thing; she knew that even if she didn’t know anything else. She wasn’t going to lay in her bed and let this happen, not while she could do something.

She was seventeen and although she had gained some muscle back since she had been working in the fields and eating more consistently, she was still quite small. She did have one thing in her pocket in addition to the knife from the kitchen and that was all thanks to her parents who had thought that she looked adorable in a Gi when she was a child (she had). Every time they moved, they would find a local studio for her to attend. It meant that the style of martial arts changed often. She loved them all and wasn’t half bad either. She had a knife and some black belts behind her. The question seemed to be what was a seventeen-year-old with a knife going to do to at least five fully grown and possibly armed men?

The men seemed to have reached their destination, hovering outside of a door that they knocked on after a moment and disappeared within the depths of the building one by one.

She gathered her courage, taking a breath before stepping forward with the intention to follow. Instead of moving in the intended direction, she found herself being pulled back, a hand over her mouth. She thought maybe that was it. She had been found out. A valiant effort, but now it was over.

She had tried to help those girls, she had. She wondered if that would count for anything in the end.

“Quiet,” a voice whispered in her ear. She struggled against the hold. “Calm down. I need you to calm down and then I can let go.”

She doubted the words, increasing her efforts in futility against the strong frame behind her. The hand remained over her mouth. There was no effort to change the hold to a more threatening one though. The grip actually seemed to be loosening the less she struggled. She took a gamble and relaxed entirely, almost gasping in relief as the hand dropped and the body behind her took a slow step back.

She turned and noted it was a young man, not all that much older than her. Her eyes swept across his face with a flicker of recognition. It was one of the employees from the shelter. He often drove the van to the fields. Rostam, she thinks the others called him. For all of her listening, she hadn’t picked up all that much information about the employees. They rarely spoke, only when spoken to.

He moved and Scylla found herself adopting a fighting stance. He raised an eyebrow and before carefully taking another step back to show his lack of intent to detain her again. He tilted his head in the direction of the building, “I take it we aren’t the only ones that noticed something off about those men.”

Bewildered by the comment, Scylla smartly replied, “What?”

Rostam looked unbothered by the lack of prolixity. “Good ol’ scarface there, David Keller,” at Scylla’s raised eyebrow, “He’s an American, goes by Amin Shirazi over here. Easier for him to recruit if he pretends he’s one of the locals. He’s not, just another sleazy American looking to profit off the suffering of others.”

“How very American of him,” Scylla thought dryly, surprised when the words came out of her mouth instead.

Rostam let out a laugh, smiling at her. “We had set up the shelter in hopes that it would draw him to recruit with a more stable base of people to select from.”

 _Set up the shelter, what did that even mean? And who was this we?_ It was just him standing in front of her. _What was he using the royal we or something?_

“You look confused,” he noted, “which is fine. But we don’t really have the time for it right now. Care to join me in ruining their evening?”

He drew out a pistol from his pocket and held it out to her. She hesitated, looking at the gun with interest.

“You’re giving me a gun?” She vocalized the thought.

“I am,” he was looking down at his watch then back to the door the men had entered. “The way I see it, you did most of the intel on this one, you should be a part of the takedown.”

“Takedown?” Scylla questioned as he placed the gun into her hand. She took it, feeling the full weight of it in her hands and noting it was probably a better option than the knife in her jacket pocket. There were still only two of them and how many of the others plus it wasn’t like she knew anything about guns other than what she had seen on TV. He started to walk for the door, Scylla calling after him, “But, wait.”

“Coordinated effort, not to worry,” he dismissed and she jogged to catch up.

They reached the door together moving to either side of it. Scylla mimicked Rostam’s body position braced against the door frame. “Knock for me, will you?”

She raised a hand to the door and knocked loudly against it twice, keeping her body to the side of the door. The door swung in and a large man called out, confusion in his voice before he took a step out the door, making it no further as a sharp release of a gun with silencer from the distance and he fell silently to the floor.

_Was that a sniper?_

“Well, that ought to do it.” Her companion kicked the man back in through the doorway and then shoved the body down the stairs. It slid down in a cacophony of sounds before landing at the bottom with a sickening thud. Rostam shrugged at her, taking out his gun and stepping to the side of the door. He gestured to lift hers as the sound of men thundering up the stairs began. Scylla’s eyes widened at the noise.

Two men emerged and sharp noises and flashes erupted from Rostam’s gun into the knees of each. A third man tripped over the two in front of him. He recovered slightly before swinging wildly in Scylla’s direction. She parried his swing easily, years of sparring training coming instinctively as she momentarily forgot about the gun in her hand. She landed an upper cut right in his nose and another to the side of his neck over his carotid. She used the butt of the gun to smash into the side of his forehead and he fell to the ground.

She hardly had a moment to catch her breath before another man was pointing a gun at her. She reacted instantaneously taking the gun in her hands and using all of her force to throw it at him. It hit its target, forcing the man’s shot just to the right of her. She charged at him, grasping his hand and pointing the gun at the ground as another bullet shot into the ground, Scylla felt the heat of the gun on the skin on the back of her arm. She gripped a pressure point in the man’s wrist and the gun fell to the ground.

She stepped hard into the insole of the man, hearing a yelp in surprise and pain that she used to her advantage as she planted her feet and used her weight to flip the man over her shoulder. She stepped hard down on his neck, his eyes bugging out and his face turning red at the pressure.

Another man appeared and she kept put all of her weight into the neck of the other man as she dodged a long stick that came her way. She felt the wind of the stick swiping next to her. She wasn’t fast enough to miss the tail end that returned. She collapsed forward with the pain that exploded from her face, the man beneath her foot had stopped moving. She raised her arm just in time to absorb a blow he had directed at her and kicked to push him away.

She staggered back to a fighting stance as he came at her again. This time she moved around each swipe until he was close enough for her to sweep his legs out from underneath him. She moved quickly behind him, locking his head underneath her arm and squeezing until he stopped struggling.

She looked over to see Rostam kicking a man in the face, a group of men scattered at his feet, all unarmed or motionless.

“You know, that wasn’t exactly my intention when I gave you the gun,” he pointed at the weapon where it lay on the ground from when she had thrown it.

“I don’t know how to shoot,” she let the man in her chokehold slide to the ground. Rostam chuckled at that, giving her an appreciative nod.

He walked casually into the door and down the steps, reaching the bottom where he greeted several men she also had a vague recognition from around the shelter. She frowned at the collection before noting a back door that had been kicked in. “I told you it was a coordinated effort.”

Scylla said nothing as she watched one of his partners slowly begin to guide young girls out from a small and dark room. There were six in total, all wide eyed and lost. They looked uncertain of their new companions. One called out to one of the men in Farsi and Scylla found herself replying.

She ignored the impressed look of the cohort as she comforted the young girls. She didn’t know much about the other men at that point, but she thought that the girls would be better in their care than their earlier companions.

After they had gotten the girls bundled up and on a truck that one of the men assured her was heading for the town they suspected most of the girls had been taken from, Scylla stood uncertain of what to do with herself.

Rostam walked up to her, an easy smile on his lips. “I owe you a drink.”

“What?” She replied, eloquent again.

“I owe you a drink,” he continued, “you just won me a bet. I had been telling them that there was more to you than you were letting on. You more than proved yourself tonight.”

Scylla flushed, “what does that even mean?”

“It means, the Spree could use more agents like you.”

 _The Spree?_ She raised an eyebrow. _What the hell was the Spree?_

“Smart, multilingual, brave, decent combat skills even if you’d rather throw than shoot a gun,” he finished with a smirk at the last part. She had a feeling he wasn’t going to be forgetting that one or letting her forget it.

“And what makes you think I’d be interested in whatever the hell the Spree is?” She challenged, bristling at the man’s assumption.

“Well, love, the way out is in.” He smiled knowingly at her, an inside joke she hadn’t been let in on yet.

It had several meanings, none of which she had known at the time. The more glorified and media-friendly message was that the way to truly help the communities they were involved with was to become members of those communities.

The organization would encourage Spree members to learn the language before they were placed. They were given lectures on how to fit in. They spent time learning about the food of the region and delved into every side of the political conversations. They weren’t to adopt any particular stance when it came to politics, but it helped to know and understand the motivations that painted decisions.

The saying had another meeting to most of the Spree. The only way to fully become part of the organization was to lose yourself within it. For people like Scylla, this was more of a blessing than a curse. She hadn’t had much of a life to leave behind.

There was no family to explain why she had to leave, no friends to ask her to stay. She had never stayed anywhere long enough to truly call one place home. It was never something that had bothered her as a kid, she didn’t know any differently. Every couple of years, her parents would pack them up and they would move somewhere else. It was how she had become fluent in a handful of languages.

She may not have known it at the time, but she was somewhat of an ideal recruit. She had never wagered her misery would accumulate into something that someone else would be able to assign value to. She was an orphan without a home and although lacking any formal education, more than made up for it.

She had always been good at reading people, something that came particularly in handy when she had first joined the Spree and was still sorting through who she could trust. It would end up being a shallower pool than she might have anticipated, but there were a couple of people that felt she could wade next to without worrying about them trying to pull her under.

It had been Byron Rostam who had taken her under his wing that first night. She had been right, he was only a couple of years her elder. She bristled at his attempt for friendship at first, uncertain of how to approach it as he was now somewhat of a coworker. In the end, when she did let some of her walls down, she found she had never misplaced her trust in him. He was family when she thought she had lost her shot at having one.

The breathing technique had been one of his. After a particularly trying operation, she had found the panic rising within her. She never let it spill to the outside world. False bravado covered it all up. As she became better at it, the falsity of it became harder for others to recognize. Not Byron, though. He always saw right through it.

“It’s all about centering,” he had mentioned offhand as he sat down beside her. He kept the conversation light, making it about him and not her, “It’s all about bringing yourself back to something you have control over.”

_Five counts in, hold one… two, six counts out._

_Repeat._

She felt like her hands were tied. Her breathing even felt out of her control.

She couldn’t do anything. Not when they had been stopped at the gates, close enough to see the medical building smoldering from where they stood. Not when Anacostia had approached and finally let them through or when she walked in and saw the motionless body on that stretcher. Not in the five hours of surgery. Not in the hours that followed where Scylla had to pretend that the woman on that table was not everything, when she had to pretend that her heart hadn’t been beating in her ears since she was first shaken awake.

She hadn’t pieced more than a couple of hours of sleep together since that night. She had been the one to radio over the news that Raelle had survived surgery and was in critical condition. She had heard her own voice steady and unfamiliar as the words flowed from her mouth. They sounded routine when nothing could be farther from the truth.

After a moment, a voice she assumed was Tally had replied a quiet thank you across the airwaves. She should have gone to sleep then. She should have let the exhaustion of the night wash over her and take her away as the morning light streamed in.

Instead, she wordlessly walked to the room they had moved Raelle into after surgery and sat in a chair out of the way of the medical staff that were still settling the surgeon. They noticed and seemed to think better of questioning her presence.

 _Fake it until you make it,_ was another saying in the Spree. If you acted confident enough, no one would question you. It had served Scylla well in her years with the organization.

Scylla couldn’t stop herself from thinking about how small Raelle looked. She looked so different than she did in life when her small stature was amplified by her confidence and buoyed by her personality. Now, she was sedated and it was as though the medications had deflated her. If not for the machine breathing for her and another beeping periodically, Scylla would wonder if she had actually survived the surgery.

There was a line of medications and fluids dripping steadily into her veins.

Time didn’t seem to exist in those days. She measured its passing only by Byron appearing with food. She would pick at whatever he brought, trying to force some of it down for his benefit.

She shifted in her seat as she felt Byron moving to sit next to her once again. He held a bowl of warm grain with fruit up to her as he offered her a smile. Breakfast then. She took the bowl and began to stir the mixture, welcoming its warmth.

There was an army nurse floating around the room and checking on the various machines, switching some of the medications. It didn’t surprise Scylla when he began to speak in Arabic, _“I heard one of the doctors saying they are ready to try and wean the sedation.”_

Scylla hummed, bringing a spoonful of the grain to her mouth and tasting nothing. She chewed sullenly, swallow dry and difficult.

_“That has to be a good sign.”_

_“It might be,”_ Scylla replied, also in Arabic, her voice gravelly from lack of use, _“It might not.”_

She purposely kept her voice devoid of any emotion. She felt Byron’s eyes on her and kept her gaze firmly on the bowl of grain in front of her.

 _“Scylla,”_ Byron started, warily, _“you have to get some sleep.”_

 _“I have been sleeping,”_ she argued back, defensiveness dripping on every word.

 _“In a bed.”_ He deadpanned, then dramatically inhaled and added with a grimace, _“And a shower. You can’t keep doing this to yourself.”_

 _“Doing what exactly?”_ She turned, a fire lit in her eyes, her temper flaring before she deflated. _“I can’t leave her here alone.”_

 _“I’m not asking you to. I’ve got my laptop and plenty of work to keep me busy for the day,”_ Byron spoke, patting the bag next to him that she hadn’t even noticed before. “Go.” He said it firmly, but kindly. She knew she still had a say in the matter, but she didn’t have the strength to argue, not after four days of waiting and being able to do nothing.

She stood and walked close to the bed, grasping Raelle’s cold hand, promising, “I’ll be back.”

She spoke the words in English for Raelle. The nurse replied oblivious to the intent, “Sounds good, dear.”

She weakly returned Byron’s smile on the way out, finding her way through the halls and up to the residence.

Anxiety battled with exhaustion as she peeled her shoes off and sat on the edge of her bed, still unmade from her abrupt waking the night of the explosion.

_Five counts in, hold one… two, six counts out._

_Repeat._

She rubbed a hand over her face as she sunk back into the bed, clothes from the last four days wrinkled in place. She laid a hand over her heart, counting in time with the beats there.

_Five counts in, hold one… two, six counts out._

_Repeat._

Scylla Ramshorn felt a way she hadn’t since she had joined the Spree.

_Five counts in, hold one… two, six counts out._

_Repeat._

She felt like she had no control over her future, like she had no control over anything at all.

_Five counts in, hold one… two, six… counts…_

She was out before she could finish the cycle, sleep overwhelming her.

*****

_“I don’t think we can make that work,” the man shifted back in his chair, adjusting the white gold cufflinks he had custom made the last time he was in London and the new watch he had bought in Prague last month. He was a man of means who loved nothing more than everyone knowing it._

_Behind him sat two men, large in build, trying and failing to blend into their surroundings. They were constantly visually sweeping the area, looking for threats. They didn’t seem to realize the most potent threat to their employer was the petite brunette seated across the table from him._

_Scylla stared at the man for a second, letting him believe that this would be the end of the conversation. It wouldn’t, of course, the files in her bag had been waiting for a moment like this. But she let him have it. Let it build up as he primped himself. He sent her a cocky smirk and she smiled back, wordlessly pulling out a folder and sliding it across the table to him._

_“What’s this?” He asked, opening it and beginning to peruse the contents. His face falling as he processed._

_“That, as I’m sure you’re realizing, is a detailed tracking of the money you’ve been funneling into your private accounts selling Damon International’s products on the black market. You see, the funny thing about skimming a little product here and a little money there is that eventually all of it adds up and is oh so easily traceable, especially when you’re not the brightest man in the world,” she leant forward as though she were sharing a secret, “and I’m sure that you think you’re very intelligent, but the fact is, when it comes down to it, you just aren’t.”_

_One of the men behind him adjusted, gun glinting from inside his coat pocket._

_Scylla ignored him, leaning back. “I found everything in that folder in twenty minutes. I barely wanted to bill my employer for it, it took so little time. But I did because, ya know, gotta put food on the table, time is money and all that.”_

_She took in the gob smacked look on his face, enjoying every minute of this._

_“So, the way I see it you’ve got two options,” she held up two fingers. “One ends in you being very dead, very quickly from Damon’s men. The other, and this is the option I think you should take, you stop supplying explosive devices and weapons to the Camarilla on the side and, wait for it,” she paused, “you don’t die. I know, it might be hard for you to really think about the options.”_

_She watched as the look of bewilderment passed off, only to be replaced by quickly stoked rage. She liked that, wanted to add a couple more logs to that fire. “I can phrase it a way you might understand, do you want to die or not?”_

_“You bitch, I could fucking – “_

_“Ah, ah, ah, not so fast. See that man over there in the gray,” she waved over, “that man over by the door? The woman standing next to the bar? Those are only three of my coworkers, all heavily armed with weapons on you right now. Not to mention, my gun which is currently pointing at a place that you seem like you might miss if my finger were to,” she winked, slipping a bullet into the chamber for him to hear, “slip.”_

_He visibly gulped; shaking his head at the men behind him who had went to reach for their weapons. She continued. “You so much as breathe wrong in my direction, you won’t get to answer whether you want to die or not, you’ll just be dead.”_

_He opened and closed his mouth several times, looking very much like a fish out of water._

_“Good chat,” Scylla moved to stand slapping her hand down on the file. “You can keep this, if you want. You have 24 hours to make arrangements or all of the info in that file gets sent anonymously to Damon.”_

_Scylla walked out of the restaurant, putting an extra sway into her hips as she walked out. Just outside the door, a tall man met her stride._

_“Well, you destroyed that cocky prick,” he brought his fingers to his lips in a chef’s kiss, “tres magnifique.”_

_Scylla grinned, “Well, couldn’t have done it without your support.”_

_“Happy to aim a gun at any person you’d like me to, any day of the week. Really a shame he didn’t try something, I do love when you shoot people in the dicks.”_

_Scylla waved a hand dismissively. “That has only happened maybe like three times.”_

_“Besides, that man was indirectly responsible for the mosque bombing in Iran last week. He would have deserved it if your trigger finger had slipped.”_

_“Byron,” she leveled him with a gaze, “I’m a trained professional. I don’t accidentally fire my gun, ever.”_

_“That’s right, but you have been known to throw a gun every now and then,” Byron teased. She was never going to live that down. “In all seriousness, watching you threaten and own misogynists is enough to make me reconsider whether I could extend my attraction to men to include you.”_

_“Why, Byron, I think that’s the sweetest thing you’ve ever said to me,” she said with mock sincerity. “What conclusion did you come to? Did I make the cut?”_

_“Oh, goddess no, vaginas are terrible. Can’t do it, even for you, babe.”_

_Scylla rolled her eyes, feigning disappointment before breaking into a laugh._

_“Speaking of vaginas,” he started, a teasing smile beginning on his lips._

_Her eyes narrowed, “Dear goddess, please pick a different segue.”_

_He snorted, dissolving into shaking laugh._

_It was the morning before their Tarim medical op was scheduled to start. They had decided to fit one last business item in before heading over to Fort Salem to pick up the medical team. To pick up Raelle._

_Scylla fought against the uptick in her heart rate at the thought of it. She was going on a mission with Raelle. They would be working together, while somewhat indirectly, in an environment that the blonde couldn’t completely ignore her._

_Scylla knew she was attracted to the blonde surgeon and only found it the slightest bit frustrating that the blonde continued to try and deny the attraction was mutual. She might have switched strategies had she not taken note of the subtle changes in body language when she flirted outright. This mission was an opportunity to prove to Raelle exactly what Scylla had been saying since their first meeting. This was a humanitarian operation with the Spree at its core._

_And if this operation helped open the blonde’s eyes to Scylla with it, then that wouldn’t be too bad. Byron had been enjoying every bit of the blonde’s outward disdain with Scylla during the briefing the evening before. The juxtaposition of her past with this present was proving to be too much for him to handle without a smirk constantly being painted on his face._

_“Look, Byron, you’re supposed to be my wingman. You’re not supposed to be breaking every time Raelle turns me down.”_

_“I hear where you’re coming from and I would, really I would,” He held a hand up in a pledge, “if it weren’t so damn funny.”_

_“It’s not that funny.”_

_“It kind of is.”_

_“No, it’s not.” She gave him a little shove to the side._

_“Scylla, you have literally never had any issue picking up any woman or man for that matter and now the one woman you’re interested in wants nothing to do with you? It’s pretty funny.”_

_“She likes me, she just doesn’t want to admit it.”_

_“Yeah? Okay then, let’s put it to a bet then?” He stuck his hand out. She looked down at it. “You ask Raelle to Beltane when we’re on this op. She says no, you buy all my drinks there this year.”_

_Scylla nearly groaned at the thought. Byron could hold his liquor. She had been a witness to how much he could drink countless times before. This might bankrupt her._

_Bets, she had found out, were the backbone of Spree life. They made bets about nearly everything. It kept things fresh, in a way, but also made for some fun rivalries. The stakes were never all that high. They usually involved alcohol in some form or another. There was the seemingly annual bet with new members that ended in one streaking through the building. Scylla could have done without that one._

_“And if I win?”_

_“Well, you get to be right for one, which I know you love.”_

_She rolled her eyes, “And…?”_

_“And,” he drew the word out. “I buy all of your and,” he emphasized the word, “Raelle’s drinks at Beltane.”_

_Scylla considered it for a minute before grasping his hand and shaking it with more force than was necessary._

_The two friends smiled at each other for a second before letting go and continuing on their way. Scylla had already planned on asking the surgeon to Beltane. She had purposefully abstained from asking the week prior after noticing how the blonde had been dodging her. This op gave her a chance to try and build more than the joking rapport they had with each other before she tried. She might as well try to win some drinks off Byron in the meantime._

_It was later that evening when they arrived on base and Scylla noticed the surgeon, tossing a kit into the back of one of the trucks gruffly._

_“Dr. Collar,” she greeted cheerfully._

_Raelle looked up, making eye contact only to share a warning glance and walk off without any reply. She heard Byron laughing next to her._

_“Goddess, I cannot wait for you to pay for all of my drinks at Beltane,” he breathed in Arabic so the blonde wouldn’t overhear._

_That didn’t bode particularly well, but Scylla had faced worse odds before and come out on top in more ways than one. She ignored Byron and loaded into the truck as the sun began to set behind them._

_If that’s the way Raelle wanted to play it, game on. Scylla had never been one to back down from a challenge._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks again for reading. I know we didn’t get a whole lot of Scylla and Raelle interaction in this one, but it was time to flesh out Scylla’s character a little bit more. Hope you enjoyed getting part of her still purposefully cryptic backstory. Consider this my application for a Scylla and Byron Brotp. Thank you so much for all of your comments and feedback, they are the encouragement I need to keep writing!


	5. Walls and the shields we build them with

Chapter 5

A redheaded woman was anxiously worrying the edge of her cuticle with her teeth. It was a bad habit. One that her mom had always scolded her for. When she was a child, she would chew her cuticles down to bloody stumps until her mom had bought a special nail polish that tasted terrible. It became a routine, her mom would have her sit down before school every day and they would apply it. That way, when she went to bite her nails in concentration or anxiety, she was left pulling back with a terrible taste in her mouth.

Tally Craven could almost taste it now. She had a brief in her hands, eyes skimming the same page without taking in any information. She sighed, eyes cutting to the watch on her wrist.

_1635_

Another twenty minutes had gone by. She chewed deeper, flinching at the pain as it flared. She pulled her thumb back and noted a small streak of blood. She frowned down at it.

It had been a long five days, arguably some of the longest in her life, although there had been a week or two that threatened for contention of that particular award. She didn’t let her mind drift back to them, she couldn’t afford to. It had been a hard-enough task trying to remain in the present as it was. Even more difficult now that they had sorted and traced the likely source of the explosion that shook the base five days ago.

She and Abigail had watched, helplessly, as Raelle was placed in the back of a Spree truck and driven away. Tally hadn’t known what to do after they had left. She was frozen in place, Abigail by her side. It took Anacostia’s firm redirection to snap her out of it. Then she was looking down at her hands that were covered in her best friend’s blood. The near hour-long shower she had taken after barely seemed to wash it off. Some nights she would wake up and still see blood on her hands.

Tally dropped the brief onto the desk in front of her, pinching the bridge of her nose and closing her eyes. She missed her best friend, missed her stubborn retorts and the way she hated mornings yet somehow also hated missing breakfast. It felt different than it had when Raelle had left her and Abi to go back to school. Then, they had known she was safe. Now, they knew she was alive, but hardly any other details.

“Sergeant Craven,” Tally eyes flew open as she jumped at the voice, slamming her legs into the desk above her with a groan.

Anacostia stood in front of her, looking apologetic for startling her.

“Staff Sergeant Quartermaine,” she acknowledged, recovering and rubbing her hands over her knees where they both throbbed now.

Anacostia nodded down at the brief in front of Tally, “Finding anything interesting?”

Tally gave a noncommittal shrug. She wasn’t sure she could have given any worthwhile summary of the material contained in the brief. She had been reading without actually _reading_ for some unmeasurable amount of time now. “Have you heard any updates on Raelle?”

“That’s why I was coming to find you,” Anacostia took a step forward, a reassuring smile on her face. Tally couldn’t stop her heart from beating faster despite it. “She’s awake.”

“She’s awake?” She parroted, needing the confirmation desperately.

“She is,” her staff sergeant confirmed succinctly.

Tally stood up, chair scraping against the ground loudly as she did. She began to close the folders in front of her. “We—well, I—I have to go see her.”

“Slow it down, Craven.” She gestured for her to sit back down which she reluctantly did. How could she sit at a time like this?

 _Raelle was awake, thank goddess, she was awake._ Tally couldn’t just sit here with this news.

“I’ve arranged for a truck to take you and Bellweather over after dinner. She should be more awake by then, but she’s going to be needing her rest so the two of you can’t stay all that long.”

Tally let out a breath she felt like she had been holding since that night. She and Abigail had been fighting to see Raelle since the first night and had been told their own work had to come first. It helped, in a way to be kept busy, and Tally thought Anacostia knew that. It gave both of them something to focus on other than their friend laying in critical condition with a ventilator breathing for her.

Anacostia had been getting daily updates from a source and dispersing them to the anxious pair as they came. It kept them going. It also kept them from storming the Spree facility to look for Raelle. Just barely, though.

Their last update had been that they were planning to wean sedation in hopes that they might be able to extubate.

“Did you tell Abi already?”

Anacostia raised an eyebrow in good nature, “I thought I’d leave that to you.”

Tally couldn’t stop the large smile that spread across her face knowing she would get to share the news with her friend. She shot up again from her seat and this time Anacostia didn’t try to keep her from walking briskly away, thanking her as she left.

It was as perfect of a day as you could find in the desert, a whisper of a breeze and just enough cloud cover to make the heat bearable. Tally had a good idea of where to find Abigail on a day like today. She kept her head down and her walking pace just below a jog, her calves burning with the exertion.

The sound of gunfire rang out, becoming clearer as Tally approached the shooting range they had fashioned on the edge of Fort Salem. In her excitement, she almost walked right by the Lieutenant out front who was signing out weapons, eye and ear protection.

She apologetically signed out some gear and then walked for third stall where she saw Abigail’s boots peeking out from where she lay. There was a rifle on her shoulder, tripod holding up the other end. Abigail’s eye was locked on a target through her scope as she lined up a shot.

She took a deep breath in before holding and squeezing the trigger. Tally didn’t have to watch to know it had hit its target some 900 meters away. Abigail was one of the best shooters on base. Tally often served as her spotter during missions when they had first been deployed. There was so much that went into a long-range shot, it was usually a two-person job. On the shooting range, they had machines that would do the calculations for them.

Tally waited as Abigail lined up another shot, choosing not to interrupt despite her eagerness. Abigail was in the zone.

Another squeeze of the trigger and sound erupted. Abigail sat back, reaching for more ammo and noticing the redhead she put the safety lock on and pulled down her ear protection.

“Hey, Tal,” She said, trying to read Tally’s face and seeing only elation there, “Good news?”

“Great news,” Tally replied, rocking forward to her tiptoes and then back on her heels. “Rae’s awake.”

“Seriously?” Abigail stood up and brushed the sand and dirt off her pants. “They extubated her then?”

Tally bounced again, clapping her hands together, “Must have.”

“About time shitbird got it together.”

Despite the nonchalance of her words, there was a relief that echoed through them. Abigail Bellweather was normally quite stoic. She had never been very good at expressing her emotions. Tally thought it might have had something to do with her military upbringing where emotions were all too often seen as weakness.

Over the years, Raelle and Tally had done their best to break Abigail out of her “robot ways,” as Raelle would call it. She would still default to it at times. It normally took some gentle affirmations from Tally and some not so gentle teasing from Raelle to bring her back.

Tally hadn’t thought it would be productive bringing up how her friend had seemed to shut off her emotions since that night. She hadn’t wanted to think about how Raelle wouldn’t be there to tease Abigail about turning into the Terminator again. So, she had left it, let her friend move robotically from task to task each day. This sliver of emotion was the first Tally had seen in five days and she clung to it and the grain of normalcy it brought in its wake.

“It is,” Tally agreed. “And, even better, Anacostia is having a truck bring us over to see her after dinner.”

“Thank goddess.” Abigail took a breath, looking up and squinting into the sun, “Want to eat now and see if they’ll take us earlier?”

The redhead nodded eagerly in reply and waited as Abigail gathered her things including the gun she had been using. The two walked in a more comfortable silence than they had been able to experience in the past few days, returning Abigail’s gun to its locker before going to the cafeteria.

Chili was on the menu and it was usually one of Tally’s favorite meals mostly because it came with cornbread made from a mix they had shipped in from the states. Tonight, she hardly tasted any of it as she and Abigail ate more quickly than may have been pleasing to witness. In fact, several soldiers from their squad chose to carefully scoot away from the pair after watching how they were plowing food into their mouths and barely chewing.

They deposited their trays and made to find Anacostia who was sitting on a wall outside the cafeteria. “You two are gonna have heartburn after eating that chili so damn fast,” she scolded halfheartedly. They couldn’t even get the question out before she was rolling her eyes and walked steadily over to a truck that was already waiting.

They buckled into the back of the extended cab, feeling oddly exposed leaving the base without any weapons after the attack. There were two fully armed men kneeling in the bed of the truck sweeping the crowd for threats as they drove.

The village had been a safe haven for so long, the ambush and subsequent bombing had seemed to have woken everyone up to the fact that there was no safety for those in army uniforms when the Camarilla were around. It was a chilling reminder.

They pulled up to a gated entrance to a lot next to the Spree facility. An armed member of the Spree approached their vehicle and after a brief discussion, called for the gate to open and for them to be let in.

Once they had stopped, Anacostia unbuckled and got out of the truck, Tally and Abigail following suit. The two men in the bed of the truck remained as did the driver.

Another Spree agent approached them in the lot and escorted them into the building. It was the first time Abigail or Tally had been inside. It was less militaristic than Tally had expected. It seemed to be set up more like a dorm than anything.

They walked past a common room, kitchen, and dining room before winding up a staircase for several floors until they were at the top level. They wound through a number of passages until they came to a sanctioned part of the facility. There was a long hall with rooms on either side and windows so that they could see into each room.

The Spree agent who had guided them up gestured towards one door in particular while having Anacostia continue to follow him. Abigail and Tally trailed off, choosing to walk to the window. They were grateful it had its blinds open. Through the slits, Tally could make out the form of their surgeon friend. She looked, without mincing words, rough.

Her left eye was a swirl of angry colors, completely swollen shut. Her left arm rest against her body immobilized in a sling. There were machines all around her. An IV bag hung off a pole to her left and two chairs lay empty on the right side of her bed. Her arms were covered in scrapes and bruises. There was a plastic tube connected to a bulb that stuck out of a slit in the gown she was wearing. It disappeared beneath the gown somewhere near her abdomen.

“Sergeants,” Anacostia called and their heads snapped back toward her, “Go on in, I’ll be in in a minute.”

Tally nodded almost absentmindedly as she and Abigail pushed open the door to Raelle’s room, the beeping of machines greeting them. Tally took the chair closest to the head of bed and Abigail took the other, both wordlessly sitting down and watching as their friend rested.

With a great deal of effort, Tally resisted the urge to pull Raelle into a bone crushing hug knowing that she was too fragile for the action at the current moment. She vowed to save the hug for another time when she had recovered because she was going to recover. For the time being, she settled for reaching out and gently taking the surgeon’s hand in hers.

The action was enough to alert the blonde to her visitors. She squeezed the hand back, stirring with a quiet, “Hey.”

Tally nearly cried at the sound. She had spent a lot of time in the past five days convincing herself she would have to come to terms with not hearing that voice anymore. She had been preparing for the worst and knew they were nowhere near out of the woods yet, but this was good. _So_ good.

“You scared the shit out of us, shitbird,” Abigail deadpanned, voice heavy with emotion as she cut Tally from her thoughts.

“Didn’t mean to,” Rae breathed out, adjusting in bed with a grimace. She opened her right eye to look at them.

“You never do,” Abigail replied in an exasperated tone, a teasing lilt to her words that brought a weary smile to Raelle’s face.

“Y’all know how I like to keep things interesting.”

Abigail barked out a laugh. Raelle smile deepened, pleased with herself.

“Yeah, well, how about you keep things a little less _interesting_ for a while, shitbird.”

Raelle looked as though she were considering it for a moment before tentatively shaking her head with the edge of a wicked grin, “Where’s the fun in that?”

Tally wiped away a tear that escaped her eye as she watched the two banter back and forth.

“Hey, Tal,” Raelle greeted, her voice still raspy in a way it often was in the mornings.

“Hey, Rae. How are you feeling, really?” Tally asked, voice a little watery.

“Well, I thought I was dead for a little while,” Raelle informed them casually. “Turns out the pain meds were just really good.”

“Rae,” Tally started, a warning tone to her voice. She didn't want to hear Raelle joke about dying. She also didn't want to hear her joke about the condition she was in.

“I’m okay, Tal,” Rae reassured, “I mean my head kills, every part of my body aches with every breath and I can’t see shit out of my left eye, but I’m alive. I heard that’s better than a lot of people that night.”

A heavy silence floated over the three.

“What do you remember?” Tally hedged.

“Um, not much, I guess. I was operating and then I wasn’t. There was some bright light. Jameson told me there was an explosion, wasn’t too forthcoming with details beyond that.”

“Yeah, there was…” Tally trailed off, unsure of where to start.

“The ambush before was the Camarilla and we have it on good authority that the explosion was too,” Abigail provided in a matter of fact manner.

“Camarilla? Fuck,” Raelle said with an emphatic head shake that made her make a face and reach for her head with a groan.

“Maybe not the time for all of the details, huh, Collar?” Anacostia had entered the room without the others noticing.

Raelle shot the staff sergeant a grateful look.

“It’s good to see you awake. How’s the head?”

Raelle smirked, “Feels a lot like that morning after a night out at the bar in basic.”

Abigail stifled a laugh as Anacostia rolled her eyes with amusement floating across her features.

“Which night was that? I seem to remember there being more than one night with you fools _sneaking_ back in, and I use that term very liberally because y'all couldn't have snuck up on an old man who forgot his hearing aids with how noisy you were.”

“Fair point.”

“Maybe keep the subject matter a little lighter for the time being, sergeants,” Anacostia suggested.

Tally adopted a strategically innocent expression before, “Abi is into a guy from the Tarim.”

“Wait, what?” Raelle asked as Abigail sank back in her chair.

Anacostia shook her head and walked out of the room, leaving the three to their now animated conversation. It had been a long five days for everyone. The levity in that room was enough for her to shrug some of the fatigue of it all away.

She moved to stand just outside the window, watching as Tally spoke with her hands and Abigail tried to murder her with her eyes. Raelle lay contentedly with her eyes closed and a big grin on her lips.

“Ramshorn,” Anacostia acknowledged, not moving her gaze as the woman approached, but remained out of sight of the occupants of the room.

“Quartermaine.”

“Thank your partner for me.” Scylla turned to her, confusion on her face. “For the updates.”

“Of course,” Scylla replied evenly, although Anacostia guessed that this was the first she had heard of it.

“You could go in there, you know, instead of loitering in the halls.”

A glance down at her feet as she scuffed the tile there, “She wouldn’t want to see me.”

“I’m not sure that’s up to you to decide.”

Scylla shook her head in disbelief. Anacostia was caught up again in how young Scylla and the three in that room looked. Too goddamn young for what they had been through.

“She’s awake, that’s what matters.”

Anacostia hummed thoughtfully, “That’s important, I’ll give you that. I’m not going to try to pretend I understand the intricacies of what’s happened between you two. But I’d wager being alive with your heart broken doesn’t feel much like being alive at all.”

Scylla took a shaky breath next to her. Raelle’s laugh spilled out into the hall accompanied shortly by Tally’s and Abigail’s stunned gasp.

“Her being alive is enough for now.”

*****

_“Staff Sergeant Quartermaine,” Raelle hopped off the wall. This was her last-ditch effort. She had swung and missed with Dr. L’Amara, but Anacostia might be her last chance._

_“Dr. Collar,” Anacostia spoke plainly, not slowing her pace._

_“Can I have a word?”_

_Anacostia said nothing, but stopped and turned to face her._

_“About this medical op – “ She barely got the words out before Anacostia cut in._

_“Nope.”_

_“Nope?”_

_“As in nope, I am not getting into any of that.”_

_Raelle’s brow furrowed. “Okay, but hear me out.”_

_“I will not,” Anacostia said, starting to walk again._

_“Abigail and Tally could easily be pulled off gate duty and come with.”_

_“Collar, I’m gonna stop you right there,” Anacostia held up a hand. “In what world do you give me orders?”_

_Silence._

_“Well?”_

_“Not this one...?” Raelle tried._

_“Correct, not this one. So, if I want Bellweather and Craven on gate duty instead of out on a medical op with their best friend, what do you think is going to happen?”_

_“Sergeant – “_

_Anacostia held up her hand again. “Not today, Collar. You do not want to try me today.”_

_Raelle sighed, resisting the urge to pout as she sloughed away back towards the barracks, dragging her feet along the way. She slammed the door to their room startling Tally and Abigail from where they were resting. Tally was re-lacing her boots and dropped a boot out of surprise._

_“I’ll take that as a sign that Anacostia didn’t go for the plan to get us on your op,” Abigail said dryly._

_Raelle glared at her._

_“What? Don’t get mad at me because you’re going on a medical op with a woman you’ve been avoiding for the past week. It’s not my fault.”_

_“Okay, but it is kind of your fault the two of you have gate duty.”_

_“It has almost been three months of weekend gate duty, I was sort of hoping Anacostia might let up,” Tally said sullenly, picking the boot back up and continuing her lacing._

_“I don’t like the idea of you going on an op with a security detail made up of Spree.” Abigail commented in a tone that exhausted Raelle._

_“Yeah, well, clearly I have no say in it or any of this.”_

_Raelle had spent the better part of the day since she had found out about the Tarim op trying to find a way to get out of going and when it became clear that wasn’t an option, then trying to find a way to at least have Tally and Abigail go with her. She hadn’t been very successful._

_They had pushed back the report time of the op until sunset based off communication the Spree had received from the Tarim. The new plan involved being dropped off several clicks from the Tarim camp and hiking in. They would reach the encampment sometime around midnight, grab a couple of hours of sleep before waking up and starting to see patients._

_The medical part of this wasn’t the problem for Raelle. In fact, she had been spending any of the free time she wasn’t trying to get out of the op or convince her superiors that Tally and Abi should join her creating a triage plan. She was thankful she had always been a good multitasker._

_She hadn’t quite put aside any time to contemplate what being on a mission with a certain Spree agent would entail. It hadn’t seemed relevant. She figured she would deal with that when it came. It was a classic form of procrastination she knew her future self would hate her for._

_“You could always just talk with Scylla early on and say that it would be best if you kept things professional on the op,” Tally offered, seemingly reading the angst on Raelle’s face correctly._

_“Do you really think that’s going to keep her from flirting with me?”_

_Abigail let out a guffaw, drawing Raelle’s ire._

_“Since when has is it such a burden for you to get hit on by an attractive woman? That is very much not the way I swing and even I can admit she’s hot and sort of exactly your type.”_

_Tally chimed in, “She has a point, Rae.”_

_“Goddess, you two are the worst friends.” Raelle roughly grabbed her pack and the civilian clothes she had planned on wearing for that night in addition to a generic green gaiter. After gathering her things, she stormed out the door._

_“Well excuse us for trying to get you laid!” Abigail called after her, causing the surgeon’s cheeks to flush as she encountered several of the younger members of their squadron in the hall._

_Grumbling under her breath she walked over to the medical building and found an empty office to change in and recheck inventory for the op._

_It wasn’t that Raelle hadn’t considered it before. Because she had. She had thought that maybe sleeping with brunette would be enough to sate whatever curiosity she had to keep shoving down. She was adult enough to know that there wouldn’t need to be any dating involved._

_It was all semantics really, but she had never made a promise to herself to not sleep with a mercenary, just not date one. And sleeping with Scylla wouldn’t have to mean anything more than that. It’s not like the desert lesbian dating pool was particularly deep, a fact that had some specific kind of geographic related irony attached to it._

_Goddess, what am I even thinking, Raelle chastised herself._

_That was not the chain of thought she should be having before going on this op. No, she was going to focus on the mission, ignore Scylla as best as she could. The brunette would understand. This was work. Nothing more._

_With that mantra planted and repeated firmly in her head, Raelle dropped her med kit into the back of a truck shooting a warning look at Scylla as she greeted her warmly. This was work._

_Raelle piled into a vehicle with the other members of the medical team. Dr. L’Amara had chosen to stay back on base and serve as the trauma attending while Jameson left on the op. The decision was made to send Raelle, Jameson as surgeons, then one of the primary docs, three of their anesthesia team, one very important pharmacist, and several medics. It was a group of eleven in total. The Spree had offered security for the op, noting they had already done recon on the area and Tarim as part of their background when first making contact with the Tarim._

_It still made Raelle a little uneasy, but even Anacostia admitted the Spree were much better at blending into their surroundings then any of the army. Their medical team walked stiffly even in civilian clothes. There was an air of relaxation to the Spree who were made up a far more diverse group with far better language skills._

_It was another part that made Raelle a little on edge, knowing that their interpreters would be Spree. Every piece of information that came to them would be interpreted by Spree. She had no reason to suspect they would alter any information, but the thought still crossed her mind. What if they did? What if they didn’t say exactly what she had?_

_She had bad interpreters before in med school and could tell when there was a disconnect between what she was saying and what the patient was hearing. It could make or break the trust that was so important for a physician-patient relationship._

_Raelle wasn’t sure what the Spree had done to gain the level of trust the army had in them. She sure as hell wasn’t planning on letting her guard down no matter what the rest of the army thought._

_Several miles out of the village they pulled over to the side of the road. A number of camels were lined up ready to take on their supplies. Some of the Spree had gotten there earlier and already started strapping packs to the animal’s harnesses._

_The headlamp Raelle had packed wouldn’t be needed. The moonlight shone down brightly on the clear evening and without the pollution of light from the village it illuminated their path._

_Raelle struggled to clip a med pack to one of the camels nearly dropping it before someone snagged it and helped her secure it. She looked over to see Byron beside her._

_“Thanks,” she said._

_“Not a problem, Dr. Collar,” he smiled back, helping her lift one of the temperature-controlled packs that contained antibiotics next. “Ready for the hike in?”_

_“Not sure I’ll ever fully get used to hiking in sand,” she admitted, tightening a strap to hold the weight of the pack._

_“It does add a certain level of fuck me to the equation, doesn’t it?” She laughed at his bluntness, nodding. The camel chose that moment to turn around and spit in her direction. She barely side stepped it._

_“Oh, come on,” she exclaimed at the animal._

_Byron laughed lightly, “Guess she doesn’t like how long we are taking to load her up.”_

_“That,” Raelle spoke, wrinkling her nose, “was disgusting.”_

_“Ah, yeah, camels are certainly their own breed of majestic. Didn’t have any back home then I take it?” He teased._

_Raelle’s mind went to image of camels drifting through the streets of her small town, “Yeah, not so much. What about you?”_

_“I’m from Iran.”_

_“So…” She gave him a quizzical look, “yes?”_

_“Goddess, no,” he laughed, “I’m from the city, but have gotten to know these animals,” he gave the camel a pat, “pretty well over the years.”_

_“Lucky you,” she quipped._

_Raelle looked around and noted all of the gear had been loaded. The group began their trek. Raelle and the medical crew were flanked by members of the Spree carrying a variety of weapons. Scylla was up front leading the way, a fact that Raelle was thankful for. She hadn’t tried to speak to her since that first greeting._

_Byron had been hanging back, closer to Raelle and making casual conversation. The surgeon hadn’t planned on liking the Spree agent, but he was making it quite difficult. He was regaling her with stories of Beltane that, unsurprisingly to Raelle, appeared to be a night for most people to try and hook up. There weren’t a lot of chances for the army to go out and it seemed like the Spree lived similarly._

_He was currently telling her about a year that one of the higher-ranking army members was caught with his pants off in one of the alleyways supposedly waiting for a woman he had been courting._

_“He got played,” Byron dismissed easily, “She was never coming. And who goes and waits with their pants off in an alley? In what world does that end well?”_

_“Okay, obviously that man had seen one too many pornos and thought maybe he was getting to live one. I can't really blame him though, who can resist the allure of a beautiful woman?”_

_“Well, I, for one, think spending Beltane with any woman no matter how attractive sounds less than ideal,” Byron rattled off and Raelle looked over at him in surprise. “What, did you not pick up on my not interested in women vibe?”_

_Raelle shook her head, “Sorry, I guess I was too busy pumping out my not interested in men vibe.”_

_“Alas, although being a gay Muslim man has complicated a number of my pursuits, I wouldn’t trade it for anything in the world. Vaginas are gross.”_

_Raelle laughed, “Agree to disagree on that one.”_

_After a moment, “She’s not so bad, you know.”_

_“Who?” Raelle asked, although she knew exactly who he was referring to._

_He gave her a knowing glance before continuing, “I’ve never had any problems with who I am. I can’t say the same for some of my coworkers. She was there for me when she didn’t have to be, she stood up for me, jeopardized her own position to protect mine more times than I can count. She did it without a thought to the consequences or maybe with every thought to them, it’s hard to tell sometimes.” He adjusted the strap of the rifle he was carrying. “All those walls she has up, once you pull a couple of them down you start seeing who she really is. Arrogance is a shield that’s easier to carry than most. Sometimes you have to put up walls to protect yourself.”_

_Raelle pondered his words for a moment. She knew he was her partner. The limited interactions she had seen between the two held true to a level of affection they had for each other. She may have wrongly interpreted it at first as more than friendly affection on Byron’s part. She wouldn’t call it jealousy per se, it was a fleeting emotion she had felt and chose not to label when she watched them with each other. Now, with the added context, it fit that the affection had actually been more familial, like a brother and sister._

_Of all people, it was likely that he was the one who knew her the best. His opinion mattered to Raelle, even if she didn’t want it to._

_Reluctantly, she replied, “She’s persistent, I’ll give her that.”_

_The brunette looked back at them then, as if sensing she was the subject of their discussion. She shot a suspicious look at Byron before offering a soft smile to Raelle._

_“She’s the one who fought for this op. We spent weeks collecting recon on the Tarim as she worked on getting them to open up. They’re not great with outsiders, but that’s the thing about Scylla, she’s very good at gaining your trust. It’s a lot harder getting her to open up. But when she does, it’s worth it.”_

_He didn’t let his last sentence linger, instead shifting the conversation expertly back to another story of a Spree agent who somehow lost his clothes at last year’s Beltane and was forced to walk naked through town in the morning holding a tea cup to cover himself._

_It was several long and tiring hours of hiking later that they saw the tents of the Tarim camp on the horizon. Scylla and a group of Spree moved out in front to identify the group to the Tarim elders. The rest hung back at a more gradual pace._

_When they finally approached the first line of tents, Scylla was standing there conversing with who Raelle assumed were some of the elders. She walked over to Jameson and communicated something before the group broke into two contingents to receive orders. Jameson was the senior officer on the op and had the medical team gather around him._

_“The Tarim have been kind enough to prepare two tents for our arrival.” He gestured over to two tents separate from the others. “The Spree are going to unload for us. Everyone should get some sleep. We’ll have a long day ahead of us tomorrow.”_

_Raelle made to follow Jameson into a tent before she was stopped by a member of the Tarim who pointed emphatically over at the other, smaller tent. Her brow furrowed as he spoke to her. She couldn’t understand what he was saying._

_Byron walked over and asked the man a question before turning to her, “He’s saying women and men aren’t to share a tent unless they are joined or married.”_

_Raelle was too tired to try and explain that things women and men did in tents hardly interested her. Explaining her lesbianism to a man using Byron as an interpreter hardly seemed a worthwhile use of her time._

_She waved Byron’s look of concern off and made her way to the other tent. She pushed back its flaps and found two mats on the ground beside each other. There were handmade blankets stacked at the bottom of the mats. Raelle emptied her boots of sand, shaking her socks out one by one after. She pulled her neck gaiter off and folded it to rest on her pack. She then unfolded one of the blankets. She found it to be surprisingly warm despite how thin it was. She was settling in when she heard the sound of the flap opening._

_Scylla walked in with her pack, uncharacteristically sheepish as she eyed the other mat in the tent where it lay just feet from Raelle. It was then that Raelle realized they were the only women on the op which meant they would be the only ones in this tent._

_Well, fuck, she thought. This would certainly complicate matters._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh my god, they were tentmates. As a warning, might be a little bit before my next update with what’s on tap for work the next couple of weeks. As always, thanks for reading! Your comments and kudos keep me going, like fuel in the tank. Had a favorite line or part? Drop it in the comments. Have a theory? The comment section awaits. Hate the slow build? Well, maybe I just like making y’all suffer or maybe I’m too verbose for my own damn good sometimes. I appreciate you taking the time to read!


	6. Trust and other things that can be broken

Chapter 6

She groaned as another wave of nausea swept over her. She closed her eyes against it, willing it away. The room spun even with her eyes closed.

Raelle Collar was no stranger to head injuries. Her personal expertise with them was something she would willingly have traded for a more marketable talent like being a sommelier. Instead, she could hardly differentiate between a five-dollar bottle of wine and a hundred dollar one and was very good at self-recognizing the signs of a concussion. Frankly, her finances didn’t hate her for the sophistication her palate lacked when it came down to it.

She just wasn’t all that sure having an intimate knowledge of concussions was something she could stack at the top of her resume. Of course, being a trauma surgeon in the army meant she was no stranger to trauma and trauma often came packaged with a traumatic brain injury or two. The long-term management of such injuries was better handled by the physical medicine and rehabilitation doctors who were scattered about the bases they normally sent injured soldiers when they were stable enough for transfer.

The fact was, Raelle Collar knew all about concussions. She knew about the light and sound sensitivity, the nausea, and occasional vertigo. She knew about the sleep disturbances and the headaches that lingered and crept up on you just when you thought they were finally gone. She knew about the difficulty focusing and the problems with controlling emotions. She knew about the problems with vision.

Long before med school, it was in high school that she began to accumulate firsthand concussion experience. Sports had always been a part of her life since she was a kid. She quickly stepped back from basketball after realizing all of the other kids kept growing long after she had hit her peak. Despite her somewhat petite final height classification, she was a key member of both her high school’s soccer and lacrosse teams.

During her sophomore year, her coaches started mentioning the potential of her playing at the next level. It was an unexpected beacon of hope. In the midst of her mother passing and her dad falling apart, this was something that could be her way out away from it all.

She focused her efforts more outright on lacrosse, knowing she would have a better chance with the sport than soccer which she enjoyed, but hadn’t excelled in the same way. Her sophomore season ended with a deep run into the playoffs and the attention of a couple of local college scouts.

Her excitement continued to build as before her junior season she was selected for a Carolina winter showcase that promised sidelines full of scouts from all over the country. She pushed aside everything that was taking place at home to throw herself head first into her training. Leading into the event, she felt stronger than she had the season before. She was ready.

It was some cruel twist of fate that brought her plummeting back to the ground from where she had been high off the aspirations of the possibility of something better. During the very first match of the showcase, she was taken down by an opponent and the world went dark. She didn’t remember much after that other than waking up in the front seat of her coach’s truck as they drove to the hospital.

Her dad was meant to meet them there, but he never showed. She had dismissed the concerns from her coach who dropped her off at home after, telling him the light was on and her dad must have gotten caught at work when she knew that behind the door she was likely to find him passed out in a recliner with a near empty bottle of whiskey on the coffee table in front of him.

She had a concussion. Playing in the rest of the showcase was off the table. It was disappointing after all the work she had put in for the event and after she had welcomed the opportunity for exposure. Nonetheless, she focused her energy on the season ahead of her. They were returning all but two players from the team that made it farther into the state playoffs than any team before them in school history.

She only made it two games into preseason before she found herself sidelined with yet another concussion. This one took longer to recover from and when she returned some weeks later, she felt sluggish on the field.

It was only leading up to the playoffs that she began to play more akin to her former glory. This upward trajectory tilted back down with a single elbow to the head with a concussion that guaranteed she would miss the playoffs.

Her senior year hadn’t felt quite the same. She was good, but never seemed to reach the level she had been at before the head injuries. She watched as teammates happily signed national letters of intent to play at the next level. She was happy for them, truly she was. The weight of the injury prone label seemed to keep scouts from even the smaller schools away from her.

Her history with concussions may have made her a little too confident when she had first been delivered the news about this injury when she had woken up. A head injury wasn’t something foreign to her. She had dealt with them before. Maybe not in the context of her litany of other injuries, but it wasn’t a new concept.

It might have been the fact that her left eye was still very swollen shut and thus she lacked the depth perception as a tool to help her orient. Maybe it was the ache in her chest from where the chest tube had been or the pain in her abdomen from the exploratory surgery and splenectomy. No matter what the factors, there was one that lay dominant to the rest: this head injury sucked. Big time.

She felt like she had an entire college marching band stepping around in her head, each movement a painful throb. She hadn’t been able to fight the nausea most days, picking at her food because she knew she needed to eat, worried that if she ate too much her body would reject it. The thought of vomiting made her headache intensify almost sympathetically.

The physical pain that resulted from her injuries felt like a mere annoyance when compared to the way her brain’s recovery seemed stunted. It felt like her brain was encased in concrete and she had to chip away to get anything out of it.

Retaining information felt nearly impossible. She wasn’t sure if it was the pain meds, the head injury, or some combination of the two that led her to forget the finer details of each day. Embarrassment would flood her. She was a doctor for fuck’s sake and she couldn’t remember if Tally and Abigail had visited her yesterday or if it had been the day before?

It frustrated her to no end. She knew the severity of her injuries and felt her body doing its best to slowly begin to heal. It was her impatience that worsened all of it. The trait was one she must have inherited from her mother seeing as her dad was about the most patient man on the planet. She didn’t want to slowly get better, she wanted to be better now.

She would wake up and forget entirely where she was, often panicking slightly before feeling the pain in her body as a reminder of the events that had taken place.

A bombing. There had been a bombing. It was the Camarilla or so the intel they had gathered denoted.

People had died. A lot of good people had died that night and Raelle had lived. She was alive. Broken, but very much alive.

She both looked forward to and dreaded when Tally and Abigail would stop by. She loved seeing her friends, but she was anxious they would catch onto the fact that she wasn’t the same Raelle.

She didn’t want their pity, didn’t want anyone’s pity for that matter. She ran through her injuries like a rolodex, one by one, taking inventory.

 _Traumatic brain injury with a blessedly small subdural hematoma. Fractured left orbit thankfully stable without any associated Le fort fracture. Laceration above her left eyebrow requiring thirteen sutures. Smaller cuts across her face that didn’t require suturing, many of which were already healing._ _Anteriorly dislocated right shoulder, reduced in the field by Jameson, potentially some labral or cuff damage that was to be seen. Several broken ribs one that caused a hemothorax requiring thoracotomy, status-post chest tube. Penetrating trauma to the abdomen that punctured the spleen causing extensive internal bleeding requiring splenectomy and massive blood transfusion. Ecchymosis and a likely burst bursa over her left greater trochanter. A fractured left tibia._

It was no wonder her body was in agony. The pain meds would only dull the pain, never fully taking it away. She warred with herself over asking for more to control her pain knowing that the fogginess that followed in their wake had made it more difficult for her to discern what was real from what was not. For all of its failings, her memory clung to the image of a shadowed Scylla at her bedside.

It had to have been some hallucination, some image conjured by her subconscious fueled by the trauma and the sedation because she hadn’t seen her since. Not since she had been extubated or taking visitors that both surprisingly and unsurprisingly included Byron among the rest. Here she was in a Spree facility, under their care and yet Scylla was nowhere to be found.

Raelle didn’t know whether to be relieved or angry about that. She settled somewhere in between, still keeping her eyes open for a glimpse of the brunette agent throughout the days and into the nights.

She was technically stable enough to be moved back to Fort Salem, a point that undoubtedly wouldn’t have escaped Tally or Abigail’s knowledge when they visited her although neither made any mention of it.

She knew it would be her decision to move back to base and that once there it would be recommended for her to move to a base with more resources until she was recovered. She chose, rather foolishly at times in her opinion, to stay at the Spree facility in part due to this. She didn’t want to leave the village, not with so much unresolved, not with the Camarilla breathing down their collective necks, holding this bombing over their heads.

She felt like she was abandoning them all somehow, even though she was aware how useless she was at the current juncture, more of a liability than anything. Still, she would rather be a liability here then taken completely out of the loop at some base in Germany with people she didn’t know or trust.

Did she trust the Spree? That was a difficult question. If you had asked her some five months ago, she might have had a very different answer than she did now. Regardless of whether she trusted them or not, there was a growing part of her that wanted to see the brunette if only to confront her. Confront her about how she felt manipulated, used, targeted out of everyone. About how Scylla had made her fall in love with her and for what?

Her head throbbed at the thought of it all. At the thought of how they had gotten to this point. She knew in her heart that it wasn’t all Scylla’s doing, but it felt better to have someone to blame, other than herself. She was hurt and Scylla was the perfect person to project some of that hurt onto.

It was hardly fair, but then again, none of this was fair. Life wasn’t fair. She had learned that long ago when her mother left for a tour and never came back. When her dad found solace in a bottle of whiskey. It was solidified when concussions kept her off the radar of scouts ensuring she would have no way to attend college. She wasn’t sure why she thought her life would ever evolve past it.

She reasoned her trouble actually started with the Tarim op and everything that came after it. Maybe if she had just stayed at the celebration, none of this would’ve happened. Or perhaps it all would’ve came about in another way. Life was funny like that, sometimes it forced you back onto a path even when you stubbornly try to take every trail leading away from it.

“Collar,” a voice greeted and Raelle opened her eyes to find Byron flashing a smile as he settled into a chair beside her.

He was a frequent visitor, stopping on a nearly daily basis, always when no one else was around. He would sit and entertain her with stories of his day or of the past, always decidedly missing or not mentioning what had to be another main character in most of them.

He knew, of course, some of the finer details of it all that escaped even Tally and Abigail. She had been mad at him in the beginning, until Scylla all but exonerated him and told her he had no idea about any of it.

She was still leery of the organization, but Byron felt safe. She wasn’t certain of why and didn’t have the desire to question it. With Scylla nowhere to be found, he was also a source of Spree information.

“Byron,” she replied evenly, a tip up of the corner of her lip as he handed her a cup that she peered down to see a colorful smoothie. It was one of the few things she had been able to stomach. She wasn’t sure how he had noticed. Yet, every day now, he would approach with a smoothie that’s consistency was suspiciously thick to only contain fruit. She had a sneaking suspicion he was slipping some protein powder into the mix and appreciated the thoughtfulness knowing her body needed the nutrients.

She brought the cup to her lip and sighed at the taste of fresh fruit and coolness on her tongue. She looked back to where he sat in a comfortable silence.

It was one of the things she appreciated about him. He never seemed bothered or put out when she wasn’t ready for a conversation. He would sit comfortably, sometimes bringing work with him or reading a book aloud until he would sense she wanted him to leave and he would pack up and do just that.

Today, he seemed slightly on edge. There was a barely noticeable tension in his face the troubled her, a furrow to his brow that made her wonder.

“Alright, pretty boy, what’s with the face?”

He smirked, a confidence lacing his words, “This face? It _is_ pretty, isn’t it?”

“Yeah, okay, turn down the smolder, you know it doesn’t work here." She laughed, "And stop deflecting.”

“I’m not deflecting,” he replied, defensiveness contradicting the words as soon as they exited his mouth.

Raelle leveled him with a glance that probably would have been more powerful had her left eye not been entirely swollen shut and a myriad of healing colors. “Byron.”

“Raelle,” he countered and she felt oddly like they were at a stalemate.

She sighed, sloshing her smoothie around her cup, preparing to pull out the big guns. “I get it. Why would you want tell me what’s going on anyways? It’s not like I’ll be able to help anytime soon.”

He scoffed, “Nope, you’re not doing that. You can’t pull out the sad, injured girl card, Collar. I won’t fall for it.”

“Byron, come on. I got blown up a week and a half ago. Don’t I deserve to know what’s going on?” She batted one big puppy eye at him with a pout on her lips.

He frowned, contemplative. He appeared to be weighing something in his mind.

“Can you at least tell me if it’s Camarilla related or not?”

He let out a long breath, “You have to keep this to yourself if I tell you.”

She gave an earnest nod.

“This is against my better judgement, for the record,” he pointed a finger in her direction.

“Noted.”

He took a pause, looking down at his hands as he began, “There’s a joint effort between the Spree and the army to hunt down the Camarilla responsible for the bombing.”

Raelle felt her one functional eye widen at that. “I thought the Spree were apolitical?”

“We are, but we’re also firmly against the bombing of a medical facility.”

Raelle felt her stomach drop flashing back to the explosion erupting as she operated. She shook her head back to the present, “What does that even mean?”

The implications were plenty. The Spree would rarely align themselves with another country’s military for anything beyond a humanitarian effort. This was uncharted territory given what Raelle knew about the organization.

Byron shifted in his chair. “There will be a group heading out tomorrow.”

“And you’re a member of the group, I’m presuming,” she filled in the blank for him.

He nodded.

“Who else?”

He hesitated at that, in a way that all but gave her the answer. “Tally and Abigail.” She gathered. “That’s…” She began, grappling with the new information her brain stubbornly wouldn’t accelerate its processing to take in. “A lot.”

“Yeah, it is.”

She watched as Byron’s eyes swept over her features, trying to collect some information she wasn’t privy to. She caught his gaze and honed in on something, “What aren’t you telling me?”

“Huh?”

“There’s something you’re not telling me and I want to know why.”

He ran a hand through his hair in exasperation. “There’s a chance that it maybe isn’t an entirely sanctioned military effort,” Byron revealed in a rush.

“Well, fuck,” Raelle sighed out. “Is this really the best idea?”

“We have some leads, Tally and Abigail volunteered to help us explore them.”

Raelle raised her functional eyebrow at that, “And Anacostia just granted them leave for an unsanctioned operation?”

Byron shifted again. “Well…”

“Well, what?”

“They were placed on leave by one of the higher ups after Abigail left base to get information from Adil and Tally followed her.”

Raelle felt her head throb at the overload of information. Tally and Abigail had conveniently forgot to mention all of this in their visits.

“Aren’t they supposed to leave the base when they’re placed on leave?”

“That’s where a small bit of maneuvering may have taken place,” Byron said, his voice tilting higher as he spoke.

_Small bit of maneuvering may have taken place? What the fuck did that mean?_

“Meaning?” She felt her limited patience wearing thin. He might have been right to be keeping this from her after all.

“They were supposed to leave on a commercial flight and may have come here instead.”

“And the plan is to, what? Go shake down leads?” She asked, incredulous. “Byron, I gotta tell you. This sounds very stupid.”

He shrugged, “it’s how we get information. It may feel less traditional than your military operations, but we have several strong leads.”

“What’s the end goal then? To take down the Camarilla?”

It seemed implausible for a small squadron to take down a terrorist organization the army had been tracking and hunting for years.

“The end goal is to find who was responsible and make certain nothing like this ever happens again.”

Raelle shook her head, mind still scrambling to catch up. She frowned, realizing, “She’s in the op, isn’t she?”

Byron looked up at that, surprised they were talking even about the topic that they always seemed to skirt around. “She’s leading it.”

She felt frustration build deep within. She still couldn't bring herself to say her name. “I didn’t ask her to do this.”

“You didn’t have to,” Byron said in a calm tone that seemed to only aggravate Raelle further.

“She’d better not be doing this just because of me.”

“And if she were? What would that mean?”

“It’d mean she’s an idiot.”

Byron laughed, “In a lot of ways, yes. In operations like this? Never. She has a plan, like she always does.”

Raelle settled further back into the bed, feeling a twinge of pain with the adjustment that reminded her exactly why she was trapped in this bed and not involved in the op.

“How long will you be gone?” She asked after a moment.

Byron sat back in his chair and replied with a shrug, “As long as it takes.”

Raelle looked down at the smoothie in her hand as if remembering it were there and took a sip. She kept her head down as she asked as casually as she could manage, “She’s not going to see me before y’all leave, is she?”

He looked surprised at that. “I didn’t think you wanted to see her.”

She tilted her head back and forth before, “Maybe I don’t.”

“If you do, it might be best to know that now.”

“I don’t want to yell at her before you leave on an op.”

He smiled, ruefully, “you don’t have to yell at her.”

“Yes,” she stated firmly, “I do. She deserves a hell of a lot worse than me yelling at her.”

Byron shook his head noncommittally. “I get that she wasn’t completely truthful with you, but the one thing she didn’t lie about should be pretty damn obvious. I’d hate to see you two keep dicking around with each other’s feelings instead of realizing you both want the same thing.”

“She’s the one who decided to keep things from me, not the other way around,” Raelle bit out, anger rising once again in tune with the intensity of her now throbbing headache.

“Look, I’m not trying to say she’s not an idiot, because, trust me, I know she makes some dumb decisions. I’m just saying you weren’t just an op to her. Maybe that’s how it started out, it definitely became a lot more than that. Feel free to tell me to fuck off now, I’ve been meaning to say it for weeks. She hasn’t been herself since the two of you split.”

“That’s not on me.”

“I never said it was. I just thought maybe you’d like an outside perspective.”

She rolled her eye, “You’re her best friend.”

“Okay,” he smiled, “Then, a new perspective.”

“Byron, I don’t know what you want me to do with that.”

“Nothing.” He admitted, “You don’t have to do anything with it. Just do me a favor and think about it. And if you change your mind about wanting to see her, reach out. I think it would do both of you some good.”

He let the words lay for a moment, Raelle choosing to continue to drink her smoothie as her headache raged. She couldn’t process this now. But he hadn’t expected her to. She appreciated that.

He quietly opened a book and began to read out loud to her. His voice was low and reassuring, the words filling the air in an unassuming way that settled her. She set the smoothie on the table in front of her felt her eye close after a page or two. She drifted off to sleep, Byron’s voice guiding her away.

When she woke, he was gone and she knew he wouldn’t be back until the operation was over. She only could hope that both of her best friends and Scylla would return with him.

*****

_Scylla Ramshorn hadn’t slept at all. It felt near impossible with the surgeon sleeping so close to her. She didn’t trust herself to not move closer once she was asleep. She didn’t trust herself to not somehow make everything worse._

_She felt like a teenager all over again. Just like when she had discovered and before she had come to terms with her attraction to the fairer sex, she was reminded of gym class and carefully averting her eyes to be certain she wouldn’t see something she shouldn’t, or be accused of a glance lasting too long._

_She had anticipated the arrangements knowing the Tarim traditions and having been a guest in their camp before. She also had been anticipating some open hostility from the blonde given them. She was worried Raelle would assume she had a hand in making them when that was far from the truth. She had actually argued to allow them all to share a larger tent before the request was politely but definitively denied by some of the elders._

_She had very purposely been giving Raelle space since the less than warm welcome at Fort Salem as they packed up. She wasn’t exactly sure what she had done to warrant the chilly reply from the surgeon and was glad to see Byron able to make her laugh along the hike into the Tarim encampment._

_Scylla wasn’t surprised the two got along. Byron got along with pretty much everyone. Him liking her enough to spend the time was more of the surprise. He had always been very selective of who he kept company with._

_She couldn’t help herself from wondering if what he was doing had something to do with the bet. She felt herself cursing at him in her head as he kept near the surgeon’s side the whole journey. What was he telling her?_

_She could admit there was an air of jealousy to her ponderings. The blonde had been more friendly with Byron in three meetings than she had ever been with Scylla. Of course, Byron was very much not hitting on the blonde._

_It had her questioning her approach to everything. Maybe she should back off and let the blonde work. This was a job. So, what if they were sleeping in a small tent that was clearly built more for a couple than a couple of colleagues? Their sleeping arrangements didn’t need to make this anything but the professional engagement it was._

_Scylla sighed, glancing down at a watch strapped to her wrist._

_0533 stared back at her._

_Well, not like I’m sleeping anyways, she thought as she gently detangled herself from the blankets and grabbed her pack to begin the day._

_She allowed herself one more glance at the blonde, snuggled beneath Tarim blankets, a slight pout on her features as she slept._

_Goddess, this was all so dumb. She shouldn’t be spending so much time and effort focusing on this._

_The sun was still stubbornly tucked below the skyline and a morning chill lay heavy in the air crystallizing Scylla’s breath as she moved to the tent they would be operationalizing for the duration of the mission._

_She pushed back the flaps and was surprised to see several Spree members and Dr. Jameson shuffling about in the light of several lamps. She didn’t know if they had merely gotten up before her or stayed up. She gave a nod to Jameson and the other members of the Spree before grabbing some supplies and beginning to unload._

_It was mindless work, something to keep her busy as she worked through the finer details of the op. They would have to bring some of the afflicted elders in first. They might not be the sickest, but in order to gain the trust of the Tarim, they would need to start with them._

_She didn’t know a lot about Jameson, but appreciated his no nonsense approach when they had met to discuss details. She hoped it would translate to his patient care. The Tarim were a highly patriarchal society and she had advocated for a male lead of the army medical team knowing it would bring the group more credibility even if it killed her feminist heart to do so._

_The Spree would escort patients into the tent one by one, carefully selected, to the medical personnel that would be split into four teams. They would act as interpreters, both of the language and the culture._

_Scylla hadn’t mentioned to Dr. Jameson or any of the army medical team the reservations she had going into this. She was worried that if they couldn’t treat the elders to their expectations, none of the Tarim would be treated. It was an anxiety that hadn’t helped her sleep the night before, the faces of the children she knew were sick that they may never get to help if they didn’t overcome this hurdle._

_They only had one shot at this. Everything had to be perfect._

_“Sleep well?” Byron questioned with an irritating, playful quirk of his eyebrow. The implication was clear. Scylla merely grunted in reply and sent him a glare which caused Byron to chuckle. He handed her a bowl of warm oats and some coffee that she gratefully accepted._

_“What were you talking about yesterday?” Scylla couldn’t stop the question from falling from her lips. She’d like to blame the lack of sleep on that._

_Byron tilted his head in question, “Talking about with who?”_

_“You know exactly what I’m asking, you asshat.”_

_“Here I thought you’d have gotten some great sleep last night, but maybe I misinterpreted that tents can be used for a lot,” he emphasized the word, “more than sleeping.”_

_Scylla let her spoon clatter to bowl as she narrowed her eyes at him. “Listen here, motherfucker,” she began and she was ready to lay into him until Dr. Jameson appeared at their side asking if they could go over the logistics one more time before letting patients in._

_Raelle had slipped rather silently into the tent at some point, coordinating with other members of the medical team over the section that she would be in charge of. Scylla made sure to give her space as she reviewed with Jameson the final details._

_Absence makes the heart grow or some bullshit like that, Scylla thought, pushing away the thoughts of the blonde surgeon for the time being. This was for the Tarim. They had to get this right._

_Soon, it was time and Scylla walked out of the tent with Byron to greet several elders and help them bring four of those with the illness into the tent._

_Byron helped one of the elders with a pronounced limp over to Raelle’s section and began to interpret for the team. Scylla followed another over to Jameson who introduced himself and began an assessment without much for small talk._

_Scylla watched as Jameson stared at the circumferential wound on the man’s lower leg. It was purulent and an angry red. The wound appeared to be weeping and was obviously tender to touch as the man whimpered slightly as they moved his leg._

_Jameson grabbed the ultrasound and moved it from the back of the man’s leg up towards his groin. Scylla averted her eyes out of respect as more and more of the man’s skin was revealed. Seemingly happy with whatever he saw, Jameson dropped the probe back to the small elevation in the man’s skin. It looked like a small mound. The man nearly cried out at the pressure of the probe which Jameson apologized briefly and absentmindedly as he stared at something on the screen._

_“There’s a pretty decent abscess here, it’s going to need to be drained and then antibiotics for it to heal at all,” Jameson said, taking the offered needle and syringe one of the medics handed him. “This is numbing medicine. I’ll inject it into the bump. It’s still going to be painful and uncomfortable, but it’ll help.”_

_Scylla translated quickly, trying to put more compassion in her words than the dry delivery of Jameson. The elder waited for her to finish before nodding once in agreement with the plan._

_Jameson nodded and used the needle to inject some of the clear liquid into the abscess. When he withdrew the needle, he used a piece of gauze to cover the small puncture hole that was now leaking. He held pressure and waited a moment before reaching out a hand for a scalpel that he deftly took in his hand._

_He nodded at the elder who nodded back before he made a cut and Scylla felt her stomach turn at the amount of yellow pus that flowed from the wound. The odor reached her nose after a moment and she turned her head slightly away. It smelled like something had been decaying and with a start, she realized what had been decaying was his flesh._

_They had already gotten the man hooked up for IV antibiotics by the time Jameson was done opening and draining several lesser sized fluid collections on the man’s legs. At some point after they had bandaged the elder’s leg, Scylla went to get some fresh air and bring the next patient in._

_She had never particularly cared for the medical field. There were aspects of it that she was trained in, but none of them involved purulent wounds and the draining of abscesses. She could deal with gunshot wounds and bombings any night, but this was very different. It made her stomach turn in a way._

_They steadily made their way through several patients before taking a brief break for lunch. They had passed whatever initial test having the elders treated first was and were brought more of the Tarim men to treat. At the end of the day, they had seen and treated around ten people. Scylla could tell the slow pace frustrated the medical team, but knew it favored the elders’ opinion about them._

_What was faster, was not always better. This was especially true in a culture steeped in centuries-old tradition._

_When the time for dinner came, Scylla felt the exhaustion from the lack of sleep the night before and the anxiety of the day sneaking up on her. She chose to venture back to the tent rather than go to the fire and eat with the others._

_It had been a successful day. She ran through the events of the day and couldn’t identify any way she could have improved how it went. The teams operated smoothly and were quickly gaining the trust of the Tarim._

_She had heard some laughter spilling over from Raelle’s station and was surprised to note one of the elders joining in with Byron and Raelle. It was an elder she had recognized from the trip before as being more stoic and hardly offering a smile in all of their interactions. Not more than an hour into knowing the blonde, there he was with a smile on his face as he told a story that Byron was excitedly translating. She had caught Raelle’s eye and offered a grin, not waiting to see if it had been returned._

_She wasn't all that shocked the surgeon had charmed her way into the Tarim elder's good graces. Raelle had a way with people and a way with medicine. Scylla made certain to stay busy throughout the day lest her attention wander to the blonde working diligently at the station beside her._

_She had just began to fall asleep when she woke to the tent flap being moved back and Raelle walking in, a tentative smile on her face._

_“Hey,” She said, then set a plate down next to Scylla, “I didn’t mean to wake you. I just noticed you hadn’t grabbed any food and thought you might be hungry.”_

_Scylla felt her eyes widen in surprise at the gesture. “Uh, thanks?”_

_Raelle laughed, “Was that a question?”_

_“Can you blame me for being a little confused after you’ve been giving me the cold shoulder since we started this op?”_

_The surgeon glanced down at her feet, sheepish. “Yeah, about that. You don’t deserve the mood I’ve been directing your way.”_

_Scylla risked a cautious smirk, teasing, “Is that an apology?”_

_Raelle waved a dismissive hand in her direction, settling beneath her blankets. “Yeah, yeah, Ramshorn, don’t get used to it.”_

_Scylla picked at a piece of salted meat from the plate with a laugh. “Be careful, Collar, someone might think you don’t despise me.”_

_“Maybe they wouldn’t be wrong,” the quiet reply came and Scylla wished she could see the blonde’s face, but she was carefully facing in the opposite direction, blankets pulled up over her shoulders._

_Scylla smiled to herself, quietly finishing the plate of food Raelle had brought her. The day had ended better than she had anticipated. There was still a lot of work to be done, but she was feeling optimistic. About more than one thing now._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Heyyyyy, welcome back! Thanks for waiting for me to suffer through some lovely 60-hour work weeks to finally get enough time to write this. When I say slow, you say burn. Slow! Anyways, I think y’all will like what’s just on the horizon. In the meantime, thoughts, questions, concerns, comments below if you can. I know the timeline has been a bit funky, but will become a little clearer as we move on. Would love to hear some predictions and what about the op Byron and the others are leaving on? Any thoughts what will happen? Thanks for all the comments and kudos, I appreciate you all continuing to read and hope y'all have a great week!


	7. Rules that were better broken and new perspectives

Chapter 7

When she was in third grade, Abigail Bellweather distinctly remembers the weight of importance she felt when she, after months of watching others including a smug Libba Swythe, finally got to take home the classroom pet for the weekend. The classroom pet was a docile, elderly gerbil named Susan B. Hamster. The irony of naming a gerbil after both a historical figure and an entirely different animal was part of the lore of Susan B. Hamster.

The animal would spend the week in the classroom then take a weekend with each of the students for them to learn about responsibility when they cared for the gerbil at their own homes.

Abgail was ready for this. She had spent the weeks leading up to her weekend checking out and diligently reading books from the library about pet care. Her parents had never let her have a pet despite how much she begged. They couldn’t turn down a classroom assignment. It was her in.

This was her chance to prove to her teacher, class, Libba Swythe, and her parents that she was responsible, far more responsible than any of the other kids in her class. She was gonna stick it to Libba who had made her sit through multiple presentations of a scrapbook of her and Susan B. Hamster’s weekend together. Who made a scrapbook of that, seriously?

By the time Friday afternoon had come, Abigail was downright giddy. It was finally her chance. She shot out of her seat at the final bell, grabbing all of Susan’s supplies and walking with a measured pace to where her mom was waiting with the car outside. She usually rode the bus home, but because of Susan her mom had left work early to come and pick her up which almost never happened. It added to the excitement of the day.

Abigail carefully buckled the cage into the backseat next to her and prepared for the best weekend of her and Susan’s respective human and gerbil lives. Sadly, it was not one of the best weekends of her life or Susan’s for that matter.

Abigail had woken up early on Saturday, ready to change out the cage and let Susan run around in her little ball only to find Susan uncharacteristically still. She gently poked the gerbil before letting out a high pitched, concerned shout that had both of her parents running into her room, bleary eyed and panicked.

It took some investigation after they had realized she wasn’t being attacked for her parents to discover the truth. Susan B. Hamster must have passed sometime in the night.

Abigail wasn’t stupid, she knew what death was. She had been to her Grandma Bellweather’s funeral the year prior and wasn’t someone that cared for the great sleep or better place metaphors adults had peddled to her then and again now. Susan B. Hamster was dead. On _her_ weekend. Dead.

She may have had a minor panic attack that her mom tried to defuse, incorrectly interpreting her angst to be over the death of the gerbil and less over the connotations of being the kid that killed the class gerbil.

Don’t get her wrong, Abigail was upset the fluffy, little gal had bit the dust. She just happened to be more upset that it had happened when she had her. Libba Swythe was never going to let her live this down.

Her dad quietly slipped away while her mom convinced her that eating breakfast would help her feel better. It didn’t.

She was pushing a piece of French toast around her plate when her dad eventually came back through the door. He was carrying a small plastic container with a gerbil that looked almost suspiciously like the original Susan B. Hamster.

“No one will ever know the difference,” he said and Abigail’s stomach churned.

How was she to know this was the third Susan B. Hamster replacement of the year. How was she to know two other frantic parents had ran to the same pet shop in town and begged for a gerbil that looked like Susan and then passed it off as her when they returned it to school the following Monday. She had no way of knowing any of that.

Her stomach churned because Abigail Bellweather followed the rules. She always had. She did as she was told. She listened to her parents, her teachers, and other adults in her life because she was supposed to. Maybe it was growing up in a military family where insubordination wasn’t tolerated. Maybe it was that rules made her feel like she belonged.

Regardless of the root of her beliefs, she was always at least fifteen minutes early to everything, never skipped a single class in high school, even the designated senior skip day, and had never broken curfew. She never got detention or written up in class. She graduated high school with a sparkling school record anyone would have been proud of.

Rules were there for a reason. They protected people. Why would she push back against them?

Here was her dad, a man she trusted above all other men, asking her to break the rules and lie to everyone? How was she supposed to do that and look anyone in the eye? She processed her emotions the only way she could at her age, immediately breaking into hysterics.

Her dad rushed over to comfort her. When she said she didn’t want to lie, he gave pause, shooting a look at her mom before saying, “It’s not really a lie. I mean it is, but it’s not a _true_ lie because no one is going to get hurt.”

Susan B. Hamster had already gotten hurt, she had wanted to argue, but didn’t. This concept of breaking the rules for a greater purpose, for the benefit of others still felt dirty to her.

She didn’t like how she felt walking through the halls of school that Monday with the new Susan B. Hamster in her cage. She didn’t like how no one seemed to notice how energetic the new gerbil was.

Her teacher even complimented her on taking such good care of her over the weekend. Abigail grimaced in response, saying she had a stomach ache when the teacher caught the look and asked her about it. She couldn’t even gloat to Libba about any of it because it wasn’t true.

Following the rules usually made Abigail feel good, great even. She was used to meeting and exceeding expectations. This gerbil thing threw her. Her parents continued to parade her around the various events they hosted. They would introduce her as their daughter that was bound for incredible things.

Incredible things that had almost all been decided for her.

Both of her parents had gone to West Point and as the time for her to begin her application drew near, Abigail felt that stomach ache return. It didn’t feel right for her. She was a lock to get in, her family name alone would secure her a spot even if her mom weren’t good friends with her state’s senator who had been over to their house multiple times on multiple occasions.

The expectation had been for Abigail to go to West Point just like her parents. She would meet her future husband there and be married by the time they both graduated. She would rise through the ranks and be a career military woman, just like her mother.

Abigail couldn’t explain the ache in the pit of her stomach when she had driven to the recruiting office on her birthday. She tried to ignore it when she signed the forms to enlist.

Her parents couldn’t be all that disappointed, she would be in the army after all. Maybe not as the officer as her parents and so many generations of Bellweathers had been, but in the army nonetheless.

She hadn’t broken any rules, not any clearly written ones at least. Still, her parents seemed to be steeped in a controlled rage she had never witnessed before. Abigail remained resolute in her decision. She wanted to make her own way, not be gifted the path.

She couldn’t help the disappointment that pooled deep within her as she walked into basic. She hadn’t felt any different.

There was a part of her that had hoped maybe now that she was at basic, it would start. That she would start to feel some of the pride and honor that seemed to grace all of her family members for their affiliation with the army.

Abigail felt none of that. She shipped off to basic worried they would see right through her and know that, despite her last name, she didn’t belong. The uncertainty may have swayed her to be a little less than welcoming to Raelle when they first met. Then again, there was bound to be trouble from the beginning. The two were polar opposites in so many ways.

One that was a particular nuisance to Abigail, Raelle Collar did not care for the rules. In fact, it seemed, she would do everything she could to defy them. It drove Abigail crazy. The blonde questioned everything. She talked back. She directly disobeyed orders. And she was in Abigail’s unit meaning she, like the rest of the unit, was held responsible for the disobedience.

It didn’t exactly endear Raelle to Abigail. Abigail still struggled with seeing how rule breaking might benefit the greater good and Raelle wasn’t exactly breaking rules for the good of anyone but herself or so it seemed to Abigail.

The two could be found arguing both verbally and several times physically on a near daily basis. Tally was stuck in the middle, doing her best to support and separate the two. Raelle had no regard for others, Abigail would argue. Abigail had a stick the size of the Space Needle up her ass, Raelle would counter.

It was trying to catch Raelle sneaking off base during basic that ultimately led Abigail to break a rule, although her focus was rather singular at the moment and she hadn’t noticed. She was the good guy, after all, out to bring her unruly colleague kicking and likely cursing, knowing Raelle, back to base.

She entered the bar with a head full of steam and was surprised to find the blonde with two drinks in front of her. “Figured you’d follow me,” the blonde had said with an infuriating smirk as she pushed a pink cocktail towards Abigail.

Abigail frowned, “We’re leaving.”

“No, we aren’t,” Raelle said calmly, “It’s been a hard week, you’re already here. Have a drink and then we’ll go.”

Abigail weighed her options before deciding. “Fine, but I’m not drinking that prissy shit.” She signaled the bartender, “Whiskey, neat.”

Raelle shot her an impressed and surprised look at her order.

They both sipped their drinks in silence for some time. Then a Vietnam vet had come over and bought them another drink. It would have been disrespectful to not accept it.

One round from the man became two and then suddenly they were throwing back shots of tequila. She had flashes of singing, nay performing, a Whitney Houston song on the karaoke stage. The blonde wasn’t so insufferable now that they both had a little liquid courage, as Raelle referred to it, in them.

Far too soon, it was bar close and Abigail couldn’t bring herself to be upset at how the night had gone. It was the best night she had in months, the perfect way to decompress after a grueling week of drills.

She and Raelle staggered on wobbly legs back to base arm in arm, drunkenly recounting the events of the night (“Did you see that man try to do the splits at the end of his Prince song?”).

They climbed none too gracefully over the fence and snuck back to the barracks. They were in the hallway of the barracks then, trying to get back to the main room where their cots awaited them.

In the process, Abigail lost her balance and stumbled into a wall. She popped her fist out to stop herself from falling and looked down in concern as she noted her hand had gone through the wall.

Raelle cracked up as she tried to pull her hand out. Abigail shushed her, which was an effort in futility as she was unable to stop her own giggles from erupting.

That was how Anacostia found the two, Raelle near tears from laughter on the ground as Abigail tried frantically to shove her jacket to cover the hole in the wall that her hand was still inside.

They had been assigned latrine duty for two weeks which Abigail should have been more upset about. She was instead, mildly relieved.

Breaking a rule hadn’t stopped the world from spinning. It actually seemed to have granted her a truce with Raelle and gained her favor from Tally who had watched with a look of utter shock on her face as the two amicably ate breakfast while nursing terrible hangovers the next day.

This wasn’t exactly like enlisting instead of going to West Point, but it also wasn’t like buying a replacement gerbil when Susan B. Hamster picked the wrong weekend to croak.

It was different. But it was also okay. She only got one angry letter from her mom who somehow had heard about the indiscretion, and the newfound tolerance she and Raelle shared for each other made her day to day life better.

She was no longer wasting energy in pointless arguments.

Sure, she and Raelle still had a number of pointless arguments, but they almost always ended in laughter, not fisticuffs. It was more like banter between two siblings now instead of the animosity laden blows they used to exchange.

There was reasoning behind every decision she made and that included the times she would bend the rules a little here and there. When she snuck out to the bar with Raelle and Tally and the rest of the unit to unwind? That was unit building and unit unity was important. Purposely “forgetting” to add her and Tally to the dish duty schedule? Well, that was supposed to be a perk of rank until they had been caught.

You see, Abigail Bellweather hadn’t stopped believing in the purpose of all those rules. She just had noticed that skating around some rules had a greater purpose than blindly following all of them.

When her best friend had been attacked in their own medical facility, Abigail knew they needed answers. The army wasn’t moving fast enough. They were stuck on base instead of out in the village finding out what others knew.

Abigail wondered what the Tarim may have heard. Their nomadic nature made them privy to some of the information that flowed around village markets. Abigail reached out and set up a meeting with Adil.

She knew very well that they had been ordered to stay on the base for their own safety, but the Tarim weren’t a threat. The real threat was the Camarilla who were sitting out there comfortable and unpunished for their actions. Abigail couldn’t sit on base collecting intel, she needed to be out in the field.

She hardly got out the words before Tally agreed. This wasn’t that big of a deal. They were venturing off base without permission, yes, but not all that far and they had been granted permission to visit Raelle when they pleased. It wasn’t breaking a rule so much as bending one.

Her commanding officers didn’t seem to agree. She and Tally were gracefully extended an opportunity for leave, something she was certain Anacostia had her hand in helping along knowing that the blatant insubordination would not have been tolerated in any other context than the current one. They were to board the next commercial flight to Germany and spend the weekend there.

Anacostia had dropped the two off at the airport with a gentle reminder that they should spend the time relaxing. They both nodded solemnly, thanked her for the ride, and got out of the truck with their bags. They were in their ACUs, sorely sticking out in the commercial airport terminal.

They walked to join the line in front of the check in desk for their airline, Abigail subtly watching over her shoulder until Anacostia was out of sight. Once she could no longer see the truck, she tapped Tally and the two exited the line on their way to the bathroom.

There, they quickly changed out of their uniforms and into neutral civilian clothes complete with headscarves that would double as a way to blend in and also conceal their faces.

Abigail led the way out of the bathroom with Tally following steadily behind. They came to a side exit with a truck parked just outside of it.

“Ladies,” Byron greeted behind aviator sunglasses through the open window in the driver’s seat.

“Rostam,” Abigail replied evenly as she and Tally filed into the back seat.

“Hey, Byron,” Tally said, with a warm hand in greeting to his shoulder. He grasped the hand and sent her a small smile, turning the keys in the ignition and the engine roared to life.

“We are going to get fucking court martialed,” Abigail breathed under her breath as she buckled in. She was almost resigned to the fact by now. This was more than going off base when told explicitly not to. This was ditching out of a flight, skipping out on a mandated leave, and investigating a bombing that involved military people and military grounds.

Tally had done the math, as Tally so often did. Including the three hours prior to their flight boarding that Anacostia had said was for customs, they would have approximately fifty-three hours before anyone realized they had gone AWOL.

They had finagled their way into booking a civilian hotel in Germany by claiming the creature comforts would help with the purpose of their leave, resetting and recharging.

Tally would check them in virtually in six hours and forward any calls they received in their room to her satellite phone. Their return flight was due back to the airport at four in the afternoon on Sunday which is where Anacostia would pick them up and they would be dressed in their ACUs and exchange small talk about the flight they hadn’t taken, the city they hadn’t been in, and the hotel they hadn’t slept in.

That was fifty-three hours to work with the Spree. Fifty-three hours to find the bastards that had bombed a medical building, had done this to Raelle. Abigail worried it wouldn’t be enough, but knew it had to be.

“What’s the plan of attack?” Abigail asked eager to get started as they turned onto a road, blending into traffic.

Byron kept his focus on the road. “A group of us will be going to meet with members of the Tarim as soon as we get back.”

“I have a contact,” Abigail said. They had never made it to meet Adil the evening before. Abigail ignored the traitorous uptick in her heart rate at the thought of the man. This was business, there wasn’t time for anything else.

“So do we,” Byron replied, collegially, tapping on the steering wheel to some beat of his own making. It came off as most things Byron and most of the Spree did, nonchalant, but not lacking purpose.

She shouldn’t have been surprised they had their own contacts. The Spree had worked more closely with the Tarim and for longer than anyone in the army.

“And you trust your contact?” Abigail challenged, unable to keep herself from doing so. She heard Tally shift uncomfortably next to her, but choose to say nothing.

Byron caught her eye in the rearview mirror from beneath his sunglasses. “Yes, I do.”

He said the words with a finality that lasted them the rest of the ride to the Spree facility.

Abigail hadn’t intended to go into this with an air of superiority. She did, however, know herself well enough to know that she got mean when she was anxious. The self-awareness unfortunately didn’t grant her the ability to stop it from happening.

She was anxious. She could admit that openly. They only had fifty-three hours. Less than, by now. They had to get this right.

Tally pulled her aside when they exited the truck in the Spree lot. “We’re the outsiders here and they’re letting us into their op. Abi, we have to trust them,” she pleaded. “We don’t have enough time not to.”

“I know,” Abigail admitted in a forlorn tone. “I know, Tal, I’m just...”

“I get it,” Tally nodded. “I do. We both know this is our best shot at getting answers, but we have to work with them to do that. We can’t do this on our own.”

Abigail took a heavy breath, eyes flickering over to where Byron was conversing with Scylla and several other members of the Spree.

Abigail Bellweather didn’t feel any pit of dread in her stomach. She didn’t feel a blast of discomfort at blatantly breaking the rules. She felt empowered. They were doing this for Raelle. Scylla, for all of her faults, was doing this for Raelle too. This was one rule worth breaking. Even if it did end her career.

******

_Raelle kept her face neutral as she evaluated the angry red skin of her current patient’s leg._

_“Would it be okay if I touch your leg, Khalida?” She asked the little girl. Since she and her brother had entered the tent some five minutes ago, it became apparent that she was quite shy. Raelle could also see that she was quite sick._

_Her brother had introduced the pair and had to carry her into the tent. Raelle watched as she fought a grimace when he set her down as gently as possible onto the cot._

_Khalida looked to her older brother at Raelle’s question. He gave her a reassuring smile and nodded._

_“Will it hurt?” Khalida asked and Raelle looked to her with a smile. The young girl spoke English? Most of the Tarim spoke Arabic, which the Spree had acted as translators for. Hearing the English words from Khalida’s small voice was a surprise after days of interpreted visits._

_Raelle shared a bemused grin with Byron as she answered, “It might, but I’ll do my best not to press too hard and you get to say if we need to stop.” She leaned forward, almost conspiratorially as she lowered her voice and told the girl, “You can’t tell anyone else, but you’re kind of in charge here.”_

_Khalida smiled weakly. It wasn’t the best joke, but it got her a smile. Raelle would take it. Khalida straightened out her leg slowly and Raelle took it as permission to begin a very gentle physical assessment._

_She applied fingertip pressure as she palpated around the shin, hearing Khalida sucking in a breath from above and removing her hands with an apologetic smile. She didn’t need to feel anything more, the movement of air beneath the skin was enough. This was bad._

_It was day three of treating patients in the Tarim op. The previous day had involved more bedside I &Ds and a lot of antibiotics as they worked through what appeared to be most of the men in the encampment. This morning had been spent seeing a number of women._

_It was a testament to the success of the op thus far that they were now being allowed to treat the children. On the first day they were there, Raelle had noted they didn’t even let the kids out of their tents._

_The dark red center of Khalida’s leg with the subtle air pocket below the skin told Raelle this infection needed more than a bedside procedure. It needed actual surgical debridement. The sooner, the more likely the girl would be to keep the limb._

_Raelle couldn’t imagine the implications an amputation would have on Khalida’s life, especially when taking into consideration the nomadic nature of her people._

_Would she be left behind?_

_Raelle didn’t want to find out._

_“You did awesome,” Raelle commended genuinely as she took her gloves off with a snap and tossed them in a trash bag behind her. She shared a significant look with Byron before smiling back at Khalida and saying, “I’m just going to step away for one second, I’ll be back before you know it.”_

_Raelle felt Adil’s eyes on her as she walked purposefully away and out of the tent. She looked around the encampment briefly before spotting Scylla with her back to the blonde._

_The brunette appeared to be in the middle of telling a very dramatic story if the small and enraptured crowd of children at her feet was anything to go by. She used her hands to gesture as she spoke in Arabic with a light intonation to her voice and then stepped to the side and began a deeper tone._

_Raelle shook her head, a smile on her lips as she watched Scylla jump from side to side, switching the pitch of her voice as she obviously played the role of two characters._

_It had been odd seeing Scylla in this new light with the Tarim. The brunette had been nothing but professional since they started the op, something that Raelle was incredibly grateful for._

_She did feel somewhat bad as the brunette slept in the farthest corner of the tent away from her in what Raelle assumed was an attempt at giving her as much space as possible._

_It felt different, somehow, to be more of Scylla’s colleague than her opposition despite having never truly been in direct opposition before. Raelle was seriously hoping it wouldn’t feel the way it did. She pushed the statement, it felt right, from her mind. She was here for the Tarim and right now she needed to be present for Khalida._

_Raelle stepped into Scylla’s eyeline, cursing the flutter in her stomach that erupted when Scylla noticed her and shot a nose crinkling smile in her direction. Raelle gave a subtle nod of her head to the side that Scylla acknowledged before holding her hands out to the children and exclaiming something Raelle was certain had to be Arabic for to be continued. Groans came from the group of children before they began talking amongst themselves._

_Scylla stepped to the side, “Hey, you need me?”_

_“You wish,” Raelle said sharply and unthinkingly. Scylla laughed at the almost reflexive reply. “Sorry,” Scylla waved her off with a smile. “I was hoping to meet with you, Byron, and Jameson if I could.”_

_“Everything okay?” Scylla asked, concern forming in place of the previous smile._

_Scylla and the Spree had been helping the medical team navigate their interactions with the Tarim. Scylla probably had a better sense than Raelle about how that had been going, although, Raelle did take the Spree agent’s previous audience as a good sign just like treating the children and women today._

_“I need to run something by you and I need your and Byron’s input.”_

_“Okay, I’ll grab Byron and meet at the back of the tent in five?”_

_“Sounds good, I’ll grab Jameson,” Raelle put her head down, ready to walk away, but Scylla’s hand gasped her bicep to stop her. She looked from the hand to Scylla’s face, meeting determined blue eyes._

_“Whatever it is, we’ll figure it out.” There was an earnestness and confidence to her words that Raelle appreciated._

_They would figure it out. They were going to. She nodded, lightly grasping Scylla’s elbow before dropping her hand and walking away._

_Five minutes later, she, Jameson, Byron, and Scylla met at the back entrance of the medical tent. Raelle wasted no time._

_“I’ve got a kid with nec fasc, Dr. Jameson. She needs debridement, surgical debridement to be given a fighting chance.”_

_“Well, fuck me, Collar. That’s fucking shitty as hell.”_

_None of the three gathered there reacted the Jameson’s choice of vernacular. The Spree had been working with him for days by now and knew that was just how he communicated and Raelle, of course, was more than accustomed to it._

_“For us non-medical people, what’s nec fasc?” Byron interjected._

_“I would like to know that too,” Adil stepped out of the back of the tent. It was apparent that he had been listening to what they were saying from his place just inside._

_Raelle looked to Jameson who shrugged at her in permission. She focused back on Adil and Byron. “Necrotizing fasciitis. It’s also called flesh-eating bacteria. It can be caused by any number of bugs.”_

_“And it’s bad, isn’t it?” Adil asked, his brow furrowed as he already seemed to know the answer. “She hasn’t been eating, she’s been sweating through her clothes the last few nights. We’ve been trying different herbal medicines. She hasn’t been getting better.”_

_Raelle took a deep breath, trying not to feel every bit of the brother’s pain, “It’s not good.”_

_“But you can treat it?” Adil all but pleaded. “You have to be able to treat it.”_

_Raelle met Scylla’s eyes as she spoke, “I would need to do a surgery to remove the dead tissue and then we could use IV antibiotics like we have with the others.”_

_“Then you’ll do it, you have to do it. She can have the surgery.” Relief flooded Adil’s words._

_“It’s not going to be that easy, unfortunately,” Scylla cut in, fidgeting with her hands in front of her. “The elders have been very clear. They don’t want anyone to be put under.”_

_“She would have to be under for the procedure?” Adil looked rapidly between Raelle and Jameson._

_Jameson scratched lightly at three days’ worth of scruff on his face, as he appeared to be thinking out loud. “We could try a nerve block, maybe. But that’s not going to stop the pressure she would feel.”_

_“We could drape so she can’t see what’s happening beyond the curtain,” Raelle added._

_Jameson shook his head, “She would still smell and hear what’s going on.”_

_Both Jameson and Raelle were well versed with the smell of burning flesh from the OR. The cautery tools they used regularly promoted healing and stopped bleeding fast. That smell that comes with them took some getting used to._

_Raelle wasn’t sure Khalida would be able to remain still as they operated. She was only a girl. Could they expect her to?_

_“If she needs the surgery to live, then she will have it.” Adil spoke firmly, yet an undercurrent of fear took away from the staunchness of his voice._

_“We will need to talk to your parents to be sure –”_

_“Our parents are dead,” Adil said gruffly, “I’m all she has left.” He ran a rough hand across the back of his forehead. Speaking quietly, he said, “She’s all I have left.”_

_Scylla stepped closer to the man, quiet words in Arabic flowing from her mouth before addressing Raelle and Jameson, “If we can do a nerve block, let’s do it. Byron and I will both stay there with Adil and keep her mind off what’s going on.”_

_Adil nodded thankfully and walked back into the tent. Jameson slapped a strong hand onto Raelle’s shoulder, knocking her off balance slightly. “Well, Dr. Collar, it appears we have a surgery to prep for. You wanna inform anesthesia about the game plan we made without them or should I?”_

_Raelle barked out a laugh, “They’re anesthesia, they’re used to us making plans without them.”_

_Jameson shook his head in good nature and walked back into the tent with Byron following behind him. Raelle closed her eyes and took a deep and shaky breath. When she opened her eyes, Scylla was there, standing a comfortable distance from her._

_“Well, Collar, it’s a great day to have a life,” she said, then paused frowning. “No, that’s not it. It’s a beautiful day to take a life?” Another pause, “Okay, that’s even more wrong—“_

_Raelle laughed, “It’s a beautiful day to save lives, Scyl.”_

_The two walked back into the medical tent side by side._

_It was some two hours later that they had assembled everything they needed for the surgery, including an anesthesiologist who despite some grumbling over having the choice of anesthesia taken away from him, was willing to place a nerve block without all that much fuss._

_“Okay, Khalida, we are going to get started,” Raelle spoke to the girl from where she lay on the cot. They had put up a curtain that fell as a divider between her torso and their work area. Adil was in a chair on Khalida’s left, holding her hand with Byron and Scylla sitting to her right. The brunette was seated near the young girl’s head._

_They had cleared a portion of the tent and completed a field sterilization to the best of their environment complete with hanging curtains to separate the room from the rest of the tent. They were now kitted out in sterile gowns and gloves with masks on. Raelle had her mom’s lucky scrub cap on her head, a head lamp that would help illuminate the field._

_“Now, you let us know if you feel anything sharp, okay?” Raelle picked up a forceps and pinched the skin in various spots around the leg as she watched Khalida’s face. No grimace or reaction. Raelle nodded to the anesthesiologist who pushed some pain medications into Khalida’s IV and hit cycle on the blood pressure cuff._

_Raelle took a seat beside the draped sterile field and looked across the cot to Jameson whose bright head lamp looked back at her. She met his eyes then said, “Scalpel,” and he handed her one._

_She made the first cut of the procedure. It was odd, having a patient awake for a procedure. It wasn’t that she hadn’t done this before, just that she preferred general anesthesia for both the patient and her own comfort. Hearing and seeing the drape shake a little as Khalida’s giggle filled the air wasn’t exactly unpleasant, though._

_Raelle kept her focus on the surgical field, carefully dissecting out necrotic tissue. She had spoken with Khalida in depth about everything she may hear, feel, and smell. The young girl had asked a few questions, but overall deferred to her brother’s decision._

_Scylla’s voice filtered through to Raelle, speaking in Arabic to Byron, Adil, and Khalida. Raelle clung to it. She was speaking low, keeping her voice down in a likely attempt to not distract the surgeons from their work. Raelle, of course, had no idea what they were talking about. She enjoyed the slow, even timbre of Scylla’s voice. The expressive upticks for emphasis that didn’t need to be in English for Raelle to recognize._

_Time floated by as Raelle immersed herself in her work._

_“How about that, Dr. Collar?”_

_Jameson stirred her from her calm. She looked more closely at the field and realized she had debrided all the necrotic tissue. It must have been nearly forty-five minutes since she had began._

_“It may need a skin graft after we treat with antibiotics, but wet to dry dressings until then?” Raelle asked and Jameson’s eyes crinkled above his mask that hid his smile beneath it. He nodded, standing up and taking off his sterile gown and gloves to rest a hand on the back of her shoulder, far from the sterile field._

_“You did a helluva job, kid,” he spoke quietly, just for her. Then, louder, “Dr. Collar is just finishing up. It looks pretty damn great if I do say so myself.”_

_“Really?” She heard Adil’s quiet excitement spill over and she felt the same begin to rise in her._

_She blotted at the leg wound in front of her. Cosmetically, it wasn’t anything to write home about. But it was all healthy tissue. If it stayed that way, there was a good shot that she wouldn’t have to lose the leg._

_Raelle sealed off the wound with a dressing and pulled the drape away, throwing it into the trash with her gown and gloves and clicking off her head lamp._

_“Khalida, you’re a Rockstar, you know that?” She asked the girl who was smiling sleepily, still feeling the effects of the pain medication the anesthesiologist had been giving at regular intervals. “Now, you get to hang out here until that medicine wears off. The nerve block is going to last some eight to fourteen hours so hopefully your leg won’t bother you right away. But go easy on it, okay. It’d be best to just lay around until we see you tomorrow.”_

_“But what about the gathering tonight?” Khalida whined._

_Raelle shot a curious look at Scylla and Byron who looked similarly confused._

_“Well, it was meant to be a surprise,” Adil teasingly mock scolded, “There is a celebration tonight in your honor. All of your honor, for coming to help us. But, there will be other celebrations. Tonight, you need to rest, Khalida.”_

_Raelle made sure Khalida had everything she needed before she left the cordoned off portion of the tent they had used as an OR. There were more patients to see before the end of the day._

_“A celebration, huh?” Byron offered when he and Scylla walked out of the makeshift OR._

_“Y’all know if that means party to the Tarim?” Raelle asked with a quirk of her eyebrow._

_Scylla shrugged. “Guess we will find out.”_

_Raelle saw another five or so patients after Khalida. She systematically made her assessments, coordinated with the pharmacist about antibiotic regimens and carried on, the thought of a party sparking curiosity that made the day move somehow quicker than the previous._

_Their last patient had left the tent when one of the elders entered and gestured for everyone to follow him. The medical team walked behind as he brought them into the night. There was a bright light in the distance, a fire burning high for all to see and the sound of music filled the air. Instruments being played, songs being sung._

_When they were closer, they realized the intended size of the gathering. It appeared every member was out and greeting them, thanking them for coming._

_Raelle wanted to tell them they hadn’t even finished what they had come to do yet, but it didn’t seem to matter. They were given plates of food and cups of an ale that was so strong Raelle could only take a few sips before feeling its effects._

_Raelle was sitting comfortably on the ground beside Jameson, Scylla, and Byron as many of the Tarim danced with glee around the fire._

_One of the children ran up and said something in rapid Arabic while holding out a hand to Raelle._

_Raelle looked to Byron and Scylla for translation._

_“She wants you to dance, Dr. Collar,” Scylla supplied._

_“Oh, well, I’m not really much of a dancer, could you tell her that?”_

_The girl shook her hand in front of Raelle more forcefully this time. Raelle heard the laughter of Byron, Scylla, and Jameson. “I don’t think she’s taking no for an answer, Collar,” Jameson said, his voice lighter than she had ever heard it._

_Raelle took the girl’s hand and allowed herself to be pulled up by the surprisingly strong youngster. “Okay, well if I’m going, I’m not going alone.” She then reached down and grabbed for Byron who pulled Scylla in his wake._

_The three came laughing into the mix of Tarim and medical team dancing near the fire and were greeted by cheers._

_The steady beat of drums filled the air as they danced. Byron spun Raelle around twice before he turned to one of the anesthesiologists who had appeared next to them. The two men danced with clear intent. Right on, Byron, Raelle thought. She shot a look at Scylla who had also been watching Byron and the doctor and raised her eyebrows in return. Scylla laughed, giving a thumbs up as Byron looked over briefly._

_There were people all around them, yet somehow Raelle felt as though there were some invisible force pulling her closer to Scylla. Every step she tried to take to maintain distance between them, somehow closed it._

_Scylla watched with curiosity and firelight flickering in the depths of blue in her eyes. It felt inevitable as they met, front to front, breaths mingling together as they moved in sync with one another. Raelle felt a heat stir deep within her. It told her to act, to do something, anything. It would not accept inaction any longer._

_Just as quickly as the thought had crossed her mind, Raelle pulled back. Scylla smiled, almost sadly before nodding and slipping back further into the mass of those dancing._

_What would happen if she did act? Would it really be that bad?_

_She had two choices, the way she saw it. She could stay here, watch Byron have eye sex with one of her anesthesia colleagues or she could follow Scylla. Why was she making this so hard?_

_Scylla was a mercenary. She also planned a humanitarian mission to a nomadic people who rarely accepted outside help and told stories in different character voices to kids, told Khalida stories to keep her mind from the surgery on her leg. It didn’t feel so dichotomous anymore. It wasn’t black and white, mercenary and not mercenary. Raelle was uncertain it ever had been._

_She made up her mind, shifting off the dance floor and looking around for Scylla. She caught sight of the back of her head walking away steadily in the direction of their tents, head down and hands in her pockets._

_Raelle began to walk after her, side stepping one of her very drunk colleagues with a pat on the back and continuing her pursuit. Raelle cursed her short legs as Scylla seemed to be getting farther away and not closer with each of her steps._

_The noise of the celebration continued to boom in the distance as Raelle sped up her pace, jogging slightly and finally starting to close the gap._

_Scylla turned at the sound of Raelle crunching toward her._

_“Raelle? What are you –”_

_She cut off the question by surging forward to meet Scylla’s lips, a surprised oomph escaping them at the sudden action. Raelle wrapped a hand around the back of Scylla’s neck, taking Scylla’s upper lip between hers and marveling at the softness she found there despite the dry desert around them. It was only a moment longer that she realized Scylla’s lips were still beneath hers._

_Oh Goddess, maybe this was a bad idea. Too much liquid courage coupled with jubilation and the success of Khalida’s operation. What was she thinking? She was never going to live this down with Tally or Abigail. She finally makes a move they’d been encouraging for months and she hadn’t anticipated Scylla turning her down._

_She pulled back quickly, releasing her hold on Scylla’s neck. “Alright, well fuck, let’s forget that happened. I shouldn’t have—”_

_“No, it’s not. I just –” Scylla took a step toward her that she countered with a step back._

_“That was my mistake, I uh –”_

_“You should go back to the fire, that’s it, it’s not—”_

_“Yeah, yeah. Cool, cool, cool. I should just,” she gestured over her shoulder, unable to make eye contact, stepping back, wanting to sprint away from this. She felt color flooding her cheeks and couldn’t stop the tears from forming in her eyes._

_She didn’t think she had ever been more embarrassed in her life. How had she read the situation so wrong?_

_She turned on her heel and began a frantic pace back towards the fire in the distance._

_“Raelle, wait,” she heard behind her, but didn’t look back._

_Stupid._

_So stupid. She cursed herself with each step._

_She heard rushed steps behind her, a hand grasping her wrist to spin her around and then Scylla’s lips were on hers again. It took her a second to respond, then she was moving her lips against the softness of Scylla who smiled. The smile quickly fell as Raelle pushed up against her more forcefully._

_A moan fell from her lips that Raelle quickly swallowed. She let her hands wander from their place on Scylla’s arms to thread one into her hair that had been down all day and let the other drift down to her waist, bringing their hips together._

_Why the hell has she been fighting this for so long?_

_They both pulled away gasping for breath, but kept their foreheads pressed against each other._

_“You… That… I—”_

_“If I had known this was all it took to shut you up, I might’ve tried it a long time ago,” Raelle let out a shaky laugh that Scylla joined in on after a moment._

_Scylla raised a hand to delicately tuck a piece of hair that had shaken loose from her military bun behind Raelle’s ear, hand going to rest at the back of her neck. The cold night air made everything feel crisper. Scylla almost reluctantly pulled back and stole a glance down at her watch._

_“Believe me when I say I really want to continue,” she gestured vaguely at Raelle and that back at herself, “this. I think we need to press pause—”_

_Raelle leaned back in, placing a trail of kisses starting at the corner of her mouth and ending at the juncture of her neck and shoulder. “Or… we press play,” she punctuated the word with a gentle nip._

_“Well then, that’s –” Raelle would never learn exactly what that was because suddenly and without warning her world went black as something was thrown over her head. She went to yell, struggling as she felt her wrists zip tied behind her and a kick delivered to her legs that brought her to her knees._

_There was a pinch in her arm and everything faded from her awareness._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, then. How’s that for a chapter? This was a monster, but I figured y’all would be okay with it if it meant it only took 7 instead of 8 chapters for these losers to finally kiss. How much do you hate me? Or love me? Or both? I’d love to hear comments, predictions, and whatever else in the comments below! Thanks for taking the time to read!


	8. Bravery and other things we fake

Chapter 8

_TW: mention of domestic abuse, implied child abuse_

The jeep jolted as it drove deeper into the desert, sand and dirt billowing behind them. Tally Craven kept one hand on the bar on the inside of the roof above the open window in an attempt to steady herself as they bounded along the uneven terrain.

It was hot. The late afternoon sun was blazing down from directly overhead and blasting through the windows of the vehicle. When they had first piled into it, Byron had immediately lamented that the jeep’s AC had kicked it some decade ago.

Even the moving air from the open windows wasn’t enough to dissipate the heat. It was just enough to make it barely tolerable.

Tally was not exactly built for the desert. The first day they had spent deployed resulted in a sunburn so impressive that Anacostia had made her stand in front of the unit as an example for what would happen if they didn’t take sun protection seriously.

The public humiliation would have colored her cheeks if not for their already violent shade of red. It hadn’t exactly been her first sunburn, but this one stung a bit more than the others, in more ways than one. Partly due to the fact that she had actually put some thought in preventing such an occurrence before they deployed.

She had been well aware from a young age of the consequences of spending a day in the sun without minimum SPF 30 being reapplied frequently. She also knew the middle eastern sun was brutal even for those with significant more melanin to adjust to.

It wasn’t as though she hadn’t considered any of this. She had taken care to place sunscreen into her day pack that she had used as a carry on for their flight over. It was their layover in Spain that had thrown a metaphorical wrench in the plan.

They had a layover that was just long enough to be granted permission to go off base. They would be allowed to explore, grab some lunch, and relax until the time their plane would be refueled and their new pilots would be ready to fly.

Rota Naval base was in the South of France and in too close proximity to the beach for the unit to ignore the opportunity to be near water before their deployment to the desert. They boarded public transit in their uniforms where no one batted an eye at seeing military personnel in uniform. They were at the beach in no time. Once there, most changed into swimsuits and then the group splintered off with an expectation to meet back and be ready to leave in three hours.

Abigail, Tally, and Raelle found a sliver of beach near the water that wasn’t already marked by towels or chairs and settled in.

It was a perfect summer’s day and the beach was packed with military, tourists, and locals alike. They had barely sat down before Raelle announced she was going swimming and left Abigail and Tally to sit beside each other. Abigail had a worn copy of a novel she had borrowed off one of their unit members on the plane ride over that she was paging carefully through.

Tally had a book in her bag that she could have read, but instead spent the time people watching, taking in the joy of people that appeared to be mostly unburdened from her perspective. There was a young couple, teenagers maybe, flirting bashfully with one another. Farther away, there was a group of young men that seemed to be particularly interested in a group of young women across the way who were pretending to not notice the men noticing them. There was a man whose torso was being buried steadily by two toddlers while he took a nap.

After some time, Tally noticed a new family approaching to set up near to them. They were conversing in English is a thick Scottish accent that took a second for Tally to process as still being English.

They had dropped their bags and towels and now the two adults were trying to corral their four kids of varying ages who looked to be about five seconds from making a break for the water. The man was trying to keep them in place, telling them they needed “sun cream” before they left while the woman was practically dumping her bag onto her towel.

“I can’t find it, Greg, are ya sure ya grabbed it?” She asked, clearly frazzled.

“I thought ya said you were gonna grab it?” The man answered, shouting a warning to one of the small boys who was slowly shuffling towards the water.

“Well, it’s not here,” the woman sighed, “There’s gotta be a shop or something selling it around here.”

“I didn’t see anything on the way in,” the man replied.

“Very helpful, Greg,” the woman snarked back and Abigail snorted next to Tally but kept her eyes on her book.

Tally shot her a look which she blatantly ignored with a very Abigail clearing of her throat and adjustment in her posture. The couple continued to argue as Tally quietly grabbed her sunscreen off the towel and walked up to them, offering it to them.

“I’ve already applied and we are heading out soon,” she explained as she approached them.

“Ach, we really couldn’t bother ya,” the woman started, but Tally cut in.

“It wouldn’t be a bother, I have plenty. You should have this one, for the kids,” she tilted her head to the four who were bouncing up and down beside the man with a grin.

“Thanks,” the couple said in unison and Tally returned to her spot beside Abigail as the couple began to lather up their children.

“You’re too nice, Tal,” Abigail remarked when she slouched back onto the sand beside her.

Tally shrugged. It was the right thing to do. So, she had done it. They had needed it and she had been able to provide it for them.

It was her own fault for not restocking the bottle she had given away when they arrived at Fort Salem much later that night or remembering to when they had woken early that next morning. She had been the only one of pale complexion ordered for early guard duty and after realizing what was missing from her pack incorrectly thought she would survive the shift without the protection.

Although it had led to some very uncomfortable days and a week with peeling skin, Tally thought about the British family and their children who hopefully were not sharing her same fate from some thousand miles away. She would have done it all again.

Doing the right thing, even when it was difficult, was always right. Tally had spent a lot of her life being told she was too nice. She gave too many second and third chances. It wasn’t that she was naïve enough to believe there weren’t bad people in the world. She had learned all too young how true that was from one of the people she was supposed to be able to trust implicitly.

She was still in elementary school when her mom had taken her and her sisters from school in the middle of the day and brought them home with the instruction to pack as quickly as possible.

Tally was seven at the time and wordlessly had went to her bedroom with the suitcase her mom handed her while her older sisters, Sera and Olivia, had a couple more questions for their mom before they both began to pack as well.

Her mom had brought a single suitcase, already packed to rest outside of her bedroom and began to help Tally prioritize her packing with more essentials than just her stuffed animals. Thirty minutes later, they were loaded into the car with their possessions tucked into the trunk. Tally had brought her favorite bear into the backseat of the car with her.

Her mom made sure they were all buckled before starting to back out of the driveway only to hit her brakes and seem to hesitate at something she saw in the rearview mirror.

“Mom,” Sera had asked, turning from the front seat to look behind them.

“Daddy’s home,” Tally announced recognizing the car as she continued to pet her bear’s fur, oblivious to the swell of fear that filled her mother at the casual announcement.

“Stay in the car,” her mom ordered, taking a breath before opening the car door and exiting.

There was yelling. That was nothing new. Tally had thought all mommies and daddies yelled a lot when they were together. She thought that all mommies had to cover up bruises and that’s why they got to wear makeup. She wasn’t sure why her mom had cried when she asked her if Sera got to start wearing makeup because she had bruises too.

There was the sound of a loud smack outside the car and then her mom was running back for the car, flipping it into reverse, “hold onto something,” she advised her girls who grabbed for the handles above their seat as she drove over the front lawn and then off the curb.

Tally still remembers the look of pure rage on her dad’s face as they drove away. It wasn’t the first time she had seen the look, but it was the last. The next time she saw him was in an open casket the day she enlisted. He looked almost peaceful. Tally couldn’t help thinking that this was a goodbye he didn’t deserve.

She had gone on her own. Her mom had offered to go with her, but she couldn’t ask her to do that. This was her closure. The problem was, even after the funeral, she hadn’t felt it.

She was still angry for the little girl who hadn’t understood why her mom would come into her room and cry sometimes at night. She was still angry for the parts of her childhood, of her innocence, that she would never get back. She was supposed to be a kid and instead she was forced to grow up at seven-years-old.

Her mom had told her to be brave in a soothing tone when Tally had cried for the home and the friends she hadn’t fully understood why they had to leave behind. She had to be strong, even if she didn’t feel strong.

Tally tried; she did her best with all of the change. She was glad Sera and Olivia were going through it alongside her. The three would spend a lot of nights with each other as their mom worked whatever shifts she could pick up.

They would talk about the future, what it would look like when they were out of the one-room apartment they were in, when they would be old enough to protect their mom from anything that came her way. They all had differing interests in career paths, but that didn’t keep them from dreaming of working and living in the same towns so they could have dinners together just like they were now, but in large dining rooms with beautiful tablecloths and perfect plates.

It was Sera that first had the idea of the army. She had heard about the GI bill and knew that might be the best option they would have at owning any sort of property. Tally knew they were broke, they all did. Their mom worked as many odd jobs as she could to keep the single-room apartment's roof over their heads and the electric on.

It meant a lot of nights were like this, the three sisters sitting around a coffee table with Chinese food containers emptied onto plates in front of them and a TV show on in the background. This night was special though, this was the night that they all had pinky sweared that they would join the army, fulfill their requirements, and move to the same town with their portion of the GI bill.

It felt like such a simple solution. Four years of service to set them up for the lives they wanted after. Maybe they would even meet their husbands in the army. Olivia and Sera both gushed over the way men looked in their dress blues.

Sera would never get to discover if her future husband was in the army or not. She wasn't even eighteen when she was walking home from a shift at the diner and a drunk driver had lost control of his truck and ran into her.

She died on impact, and that, her mom had said, should bring them comfort.

It didn’t bring Tally much of anything but an emptiness she had never felt before when she realized she would never get to talk with Sera or listen to Sera’s likely hyperbolic stories about what happened at school that day. Sera would never be able to enlist like they had promised that night.

Olivia took Sera’s death as hard as Tally and nearly shut down on everyone except for her remaining sister. She hadn't told their mom when she went to enlist, knowing it would be a shock to her so soon after losing Sera. She brought Tally with her instead. She brought the third person she had made the pinky promise to and they both felt Sera’s absence that evening harder than ever.

Their mom, as expected, hadn’t been all that excited when Olivia informed her about enlisting. She did her best to be supportive, but Tally heard her crying when she went to the bathroom in the middle of the night.

Tally did her best, once again, to be strong and be brave. Olivia was nervous about leaving, Tally couldn’t add her fears to that.

It was everything she had been pushing away when not a month into Olivia’s first deployment there was a knock at the door and uniformed men on the other side. Tally’s heart had sunk. Olivia’s Humvee had hit an IED. There had been no survivors.

It had been quick, they said, she wouldn’t have suffered if that was some comfort to them.

Again, it wasn’t. Not to Tally who was the last standing Craven sister. She had only been pretending, didn't anyone realize that? She wasn’t strong. She wasn’t brave. How was she supposed to keep pretending?

Her eighteenth birthday came and she couldn’t bring herself to fulfill her promise, not with Sera and Olivia both gone. Did the pinky promise even count anymore? Who was there to hold her accountable for a promise she had made over Chinese food to sisters who were no longer alive?

The news of her dad’s death some odd months after her high school graduation barely made a blip on her radar when she had been informed. She decided to go. For Sera and Olivia. For her mom.

Tally went and she was told by relatives she didn’t remember how brave and strong she was. She had smiled through it until she couldn’t’ handle it anymore and left. She walked aimlessly for some time, her mom had been planning on picking her up after her shift ended in a couple more hours.

Tally’s feet carried her to the recruitment office and she stared up at the building feeling everything and nothing all at once. She wanted to be brave. She wanted to be strong. She wanted to be the kind of person who kept her promises.

So, she walked in and signed a contract that she knew would break her mom’s heart.

She made it through her first deployment and then her second. She made it for Sera and for Olivia. She never fully relaxed. She knew all too well how in the blink of an eye, everything could be taken away.

She found best friends who were like sisters to her. She found a man in uniform that she thought was everything she had been dreaming of until his fiancée walked in on them and she realized it was nothing like the dream after all.

Tally continued to pretend that she was strong and that she was brave, hoping no one would catch onto the fact that she was terrified most days. She was terrified right now, thinking of what had happened to her best friend in a place that she was supposed to be safe.

_Fifty-two hours left._

Tally looked to her left to see Abigail stealing a glance at her watch, likely thinking the same thing. They had one less hour to work this.

Scylla sat in the front seat beside Byron, quiet music filtering through the radio. They had decided to split up at the Spree base, sending a team to investigate another lead while their team went to meet some members of the Tarim. It might be a dead end. Tally knew that, she still hoped.

Tally took in a long and measured breath as she sat to her full height before letting it out.

Byron slowed to a stop and turned the vehicle off, sharing a look with Scylla who had been uncharacteristically terse since they had driven out of the Spree facility.

“So, what now?” Abigail broke the silence, leaning forward in her seat.

“Now, we wait,” Scylla replied, unbuckling her seat belt and stepping out of the jeep. Byron remained in his seat, making no move to exit.

Tally took the chance to get out of the backseat where Abigail’s impatience with everything was spilling over despite her best efforts to contain it.

She trudged through the sand to where Scylla stood, looking out across the horizon. Scylla gave a nod of acknowledgement as she approached, but said nothing.

Tally shifted beside her, feeling the heat of the sun on her skin. Perspiration trailed down the back of her neck.

Scylla looked calm. There was an air of authority she carried with her that was probably borne in part due to being a female in a male dominated organization. It suited her. The only tell that she was as anxious as the rest of them was a slight fidget in her hands as they stood.

Tally didn’t mention it, she knew it wouldn’t be productive to point out. She instead handed Scylla the scope she had taken off her rifle that morning. Tally wasn’t all that particular about using Spree weapons, but the scope was one she was comfortable with and preferred it to some novel tool.

Scylla took the scope with a quiet thanks and brought it up to her eye, carefully tracking from left to right over the bend where they expected the Tarim to appear from.

Tally took a deliberate breath into her belly, imagining her lungs filling with air, her ribs expanding, her abdomen full. She then exhaled audibly in reverse.

“Pranayama?” Scylla asked, her eye still pressed to the scope.

Tally laughed a little at being caught practicing yoga breathing, “Yeah. It helps keep me calm.”

 _It helps me feel brave,_ Tally finished in her head.

Scylla smiled, lowering the scope and holding it out to the redhead. “I’ve always been a fan of counting, but Byron says that’s because I have no spiritual connection.”

“I don’t know about that,” Tally pondered, taking the offered scope back and scanning with it. “Everyone has a spiritual connection. It’s all the same principle when it comes down to it." She paused, before speaking quietly, pointedly keeping her eye pressed to the scope as she spoke. "You could have seen her, you know. Before we left."

She heard a deep sigh beside her, “I didn’t think that was a good idea.”

Tally let the scope fall to her side and really looked at the brunette. There were dark circles under her eyes that held a puffiness only lack of sleep could provide. She looked like she could use a good meal and a better sleep. “I think maybe you and Raelle think too much sometimes,” Tally mused.

Scylla bit out a sardonic laugh.

“She cares about you and you care about her. The rest will sort itself out.”

Scylla met her eyes, looking for something there. “I’m not sure that it’s that easy.”

“Well, it’s definitely not as hard as you two have made it from day one.”

“Scyl,” Byron called out breaking the two from their conversation. He was stepping out of the jeep and pointed over their shoulders. Tally held up the scope and noted a small group of people in the distance walking towards them.

Abigail came out of the jeep to stand with them. Four members of the Tarim stepped closer. When they were finally within a certain distance, Tally recognized Adil in the group as did Abigail who immediately began to look at her feet until Tally lightly stepped on her toe to bring her back to attention.

One of the men called out a greeting that both Byron and Scylla returned.

Adil nodded as he walked directly past Byron, Scylla, and Tally to stand in front of Abigail. The two stood uncomfortably smiling at each other before Abigail awkwardly offered a hug that Adil sheepishly accepted.

Tally rolled her eyes, shaking her head to the amusement of Byron and Scylla who were watching the interaction with looks of interest. Adil stayed tied to Abigail’s side as the other men began to speak in Arabic.

Adil translated for Abigail and Tally, “They are saying hello to Scylla and Byron, saying it is good to cross paths with them again. Also, they are happy to meet you both as well. Any friend of the Spree is a friend of ours.”

Tally and Abigail both nodded toward the men in greeting which they returned.

“What way can we help?” Adil interpreted as the man spoke again.

“Have you seen any unusual movement patterns in your travel in the last few weeks? Maybe more groups than normal passing in a specific direction?” Adil spoke as Scylla asked the men in Arabic.

The men all paused to think before beginning to answer. “He says that there have been a couple of things out of the ordinary happening. More people seem to be headed west.”

“West?” Abigail asked and Adil nodded. She looked over to Scylla who clarified something in Arabic.

“He says we have suspected a nearby village of being overrun by Camarilla. It is also west and thought that maybe that was where they were headed.”

“Which village?” Byron asked in English then rapid Arabic. The man replied and gestured at Adil.

Byron and Scylla turned to him.

“What did he say, Adil?” Abigail asked quietly as all the focus had shifted to him.

Adil nodded to the other Tarim members in acceptance, then to Abigail and Tally, “He says that I can show you.”

Abigail started to protest, “We really don’t want any of you involved, if they find out and retaliate—“

“Then so be it. Bombing a medical facility is an act of cowardice. There is no room for such cowardice amongst our people,” Adil spoke firmly and passionately.

Honor was an expectation in this culture. To lose one's honor was a fate worse than losing one's life.

Tally respected the sentiment, but shared Scylla and Byron’s concern about retaliation against the Tarim. They were a mostly peaceful people. Their only weapons were used for hunting and protection from predators that weren’t human.

Scylla and Byron appeared to be having some sort of silent conversation through a series of micro movements and expressions.

Scylla eventually blinked heavily, tilting her head back and forth before speaking to the men in Arabic, Byron translating for Abigail and Tally. “If it’s okay with you, we will have him change into some of Byron’s spare clothing so he can blend into our group better. It is better if he is presumed to be Spree. We appreciate the sacrifice of this offer.”

The man nodded, reaching a hand out that Scylla grasped and bowed her head to him.

“He wishes us luck,” Byron spoke as Adil said his goodbyes to his people and walked back towards them. The five went to the jeep and buckled in.

_Fifty-two hours, thirty-three minutes remaining._

Tally could be brave and strong for her friends. She had been pretending since she was a child. She wasn’t about to stop now.

*****

_It was not going according to plan. Scylla absentmindedly thought that had to be in the running for understatement of the year._

_She was currently slouched in the bed of a covered truck. The canvas was flapping as they sped along a dirt road in the far reaches of the desert. The black bag that had been on her head must have been removed sometime before she had woken up. There were small openings in the canvas, but no way to track where they were in the dark of night other than far from any civilization based on the lack of light._

_Her hands were ziptied uncomfortably behind her back and a rather large man was seated near the end of the truck bed with a rather large gun and a general air of annoyance._

_These parts were to be expected. What was not to be expected was the small blonde surgeon who was still drugged and motionless across from her._

_Scylla had tried to get her to go back to the fire, she had. But then she had kissed her and there was a brief moment where Raelle was under some delusion that Scylla was going to reject her._

_It was foolish of her to run after her. It was foolish of her to kiss her again. It was her foolish actions that led the surgeon to be laying across from her after likely being dosed with a much too high an amount of medicine for her petite body weight._

_She was breathing, Scylla had checked that first and felt her momentary panic settle slightly. She would wake up. Scylla just needed it to be before they reached wherever they were being taken to._

_She subtly kicked her leg out and made contact with Raelle’s boot. The blonde stirred at the action. A light groan falling from her lips and the large man imperceptibly lifted his gun. Scylla shot a tired glance in his direction. Where exactly did he think they were going to run? He sat at the only exit of the speeding truck. The man met her gaze and reluctantly let the gun fall back to its resting place after a moment._

_“Rae,” Scylla kept her voice low enough that the noise of the truck kept it muffled from where the man sat. “Raelle, you gotta wake up, okay?”_

_Raelle rolled to her side, settling back in. Scylla kicked her leg out and connected with the surgeon’s shin this time. “Ow, what the fuck?” Came the slurred reply._

_“Raelle,” Scylla tried again and now the blonde blinked heavily in her direction, confusion painted across her features as her mind tried to catch up._

_She groaned, wincing as she tried to sit up. “Where are we?”_

_“I don’t know,” Scylla answered truthfully._

_Raelle made to stand and adjust into a more comfortable position causing the man to shout in Arabic, telling her to stay sitting._

_“You gotta stay seated,” Scylla translated, taking the malice out of the instructions._

_“What happened?” Raelle asked as she shifted, but remained seated. “The last thing I remember was…” A faint blush painted her cheeks and even in the darkness Scylla recognized it. She felt a flutter in her stomach at the memory of what they had been doing when they were grabbed._

_She was jolted from the memory as the truck came to a sudden stop. Raelle, Scylla, and the man all slid several inches toward the cab of the truck._

_Scylla waited a beat and when she was sure they weren’t going to continue driving, spoke quickly, “Not enough time. Raelle, look, it’s going to be better if these people know you as Spree, okay?”_

_“Why would it—“_

_“I don’t have time to explain, you just have to trust me on this,” Scylla pleaded, hearing the slam of the truck’s cab doors and footsteps following it. “Do you have anything on you that would identify you as anything else?”_

_Raelle looked thoughtful for a moment before replying, “my dog tags.”_

_“Can you take them off?”_

_“I’m a little tied up at the moment, Scyl, if you didn’t realize,” Raelle replied with an edge to her words._

_“Use your mouth.”_

_“Now doesn’t seem like the right time– “_

_Scylla rolled her eyes, frustration building. Now the blonde wanted to flirt? After months of her trying and she chose now to start reciprocating? “Not for that. Focus! Bite your dog tags off their chain and spit them out as we walk. I’ll make a distraction.”_

_The back flap of the truck bed was flipped up and more men with guns dropped the tailgate, letting the large man out before demanding Raelle and Scylla follow._

_Scylla went first, her head brushing the top of the canvas as she stooped out with Raelle close behind her. The blonde had the chain of her necklace in her mouth, a slight glint to the silver illuminated by the flashlights the men were using._

_Okay, Scylla, now you need a distraction._

_Scylla was a feminist, through and through. She did, however, believe some clichés about women were best when captured and repurposed for women. Like the one about women having weak ankles._

_Scylla stumbled forward, landing in a heap, apologizing in Arabic again and again. One man came and tried to get her up, but she fell to the other side and eventually drew the attention and help of two men with the third keeping his eyes on all the commotion._

_Scylla watched as Raelle subtly spit to the side and kept walking forward. She popped back to her feet and absorbed a blow of encouragement to her ribs with a grunt. The third man seemed to remember something and quickly put the black bags over the women’s heads before continuing to usher them along, now holding an elbow of each of the women._

_They walked for some time, sandy, uneven terrain becoming level concrete as they were shoved inside some kind of enclosure. Scylla nearly fell down the first stair without any warning that it was coming._

_Basements were rare in the desert homes, although they sometimes existed for storage. Whether that be for normal reasons or contraband, they came into use._

_“Stairs,” Scylla said under her breath for Raelle, hearing the blonde’s stuttered steps behind her._

_A rancid odor filled the air and Scylla felt her nose wrinkle at it. She began to breathe through her mouth although she wasn’t certain that helped at all._

_She was shoved into a wall that she immediately slid down to sit. The blonde was deposited to her right. The black bag was removed and Scylla’s eyes rushed to adjust to the low-lit room. It was bare aside from a number of crates that were stacked throughout the room._

_The three men in front of her bore no identifying marks of any kind. They were dressed in nondescript clothing. Scylla clocked two pistols, the semi-automatic rifle in the large man’s hands, and a knife collectively on the men._

_She heard Raelle shifting beside her and shot a warning glance out of the corner of her eye at the blonde. Now was not a good time for whatever the blonde was planning._

_Scylla’s mind was scrambling for a good cover for why her companion didn’t speak Arabic. It was common knowledge the Spree trained their people in languages before they were deployed. Yet, here was this small agent who didn’t speak it? At least her dog tags were somewhere in the sand outside, concealed by the darkness._

_She was interrupted from her thoughts at the sound of more men lumbering down the stairs. Scylla kept her stare straight forward, her features displaying boredom as she carefully unstrapped her watch from her wrist and shoved it into a gap in the brick wall behind her._

_One of the men exuded a confidence and swagger the others appeared to lack. He stepped closer to them, snapping his fingers until another of the men brought him a chair._

_“Are we not entertaining you?” The man asked in Arabic, wiping the chair off before sitting down. The other men arranged themselves around the room, weapons all visible and pointed in Scylla and Raelle’s direction. “And here I thought a black bag would grab your attention.”_

_Scylla tilted her head at him, a smirk forming on her lips as she replied in Arabic, “A little elementary of a gameplan. You do know we’re Spree, right? If we don’t get kidnapped at least once a month, our pay goes down.”_

_She could feel a questioning gaze from Raelle at the tone of her reply. She ignored it._

_The man smiled a humorless grin, humming as he pulled out a large knife and began to spin it in his hands. The dim ceiling light reflected off the silver exterior as it spun. “You’ve caused a lot of problems for me, did you know that?”_

_Scylla shrugged. “You’re going to have to be more specific. We’ve caused a lot of problems for a lot of people.”_

_The man rose from the chair, stepping forcefully into Scylla’s space and roughly grabbing her chin to force her to look at him, placing the knife along the vessels in her neck. “You know exactly what you’ve done so don’t play stupid with me, girl. You can mess with other people, but when you start messing with the Carmarilla, a black bag will be the least of your worries.”_

_He shoved her face away from him, Scylla winced as the blade nicked her skin._

_It was confirmation of what she had already known. This was the Camarilla. They were not happy she was blackmailing one of their weapons suppliers. She, on the other hand was very happy that they had finally identified one of their larger arms dealers._

_“What, is this one, stupid?” The man moved to Raelle and spat the question in her face, holding the knife in her direction. Scylla watched as the blonde stared him down having no clue what he said to her. “Spree recruiting has gone downhill. There used to be standards.” He muttered and Scylla kept from rolling her eyes._

_“Our standards are still much higher than getting into your organization. What does it take, really, to become Camarilla? A little murder? A little kidnapping? A lot of cowardice?” Scylla was testing the man’s patience, but her words had the desired effect as he left Raelle’s side to angrily deliver a backhand to her cheek._

_“You should watch your tongue,” he spoke with vitriol, a mere inch from her face. She could smell the tobacco on his breath. “Or we will have to watch it for you.”_

_Scylla’s mouth had filled with blood from the blow and she deliberately allowed it to pool rather than give him the satisfaction. Her face ached from where he had hit her. She could feel a trickle of blood on the outside of her cheek from where he must have been wearing a ring._

_She kept eye contact with the man, refusing to back down. She wasn’t about to give him the satisfaction._

_The ringtone of a satellite phone cut through the tense air. One of the other men answered, then quickly held the phone out to the man in front of Scylla. He kept eye contact as he picked up the phone, only breaking it to walk away. He gestured for the others to follow him up the stairs and they did, leaving Raelle and Scylla alone._

_As soon as the door to the basement shut, Scylla spit out the blood in her mouth to her left, despising the copper taste it left._

_Raelle shuffled to a squat in front of her, concern written on her features. “Are you okay?”_

_She watched as Raelle’s eyes flicked from her cheek to her neck and then to her eyes. “I’m good. Nothing like a backhand from men who love jewelry.” She smiled and Raelle looked skeptical. “I’m fine. I am. You should sit.”_

_Raelle slowly sat down, still in front of her. “What the fuck were Camarilla doing in a Tarim camp?”_

_Scylla wasn't surprised the blonde had picked up on the word among the others. The blonde was smart. Too smart sometimes._

_There was a long and a short explanation of that and Scylla wasn’t certain they had time for either. She heard the men shuffling next to the basement door._

_“I don’t think they’ll kill us,” Scylla pondered out loud. “It would be too messy and wouldn’t serve the purpose of all of this. You can’t let them know you don’t know Arabic. Just follow my lead.”_

_“And talk back to them so I can get slapped? No thanks,” Raelle said with a grin that fell just short of the teasing she had likely intended for._

_“You know me, I’ve got a certain charm,” Scylla smiled genuinely back at her._

_“Is that what they’re calling it these days?”_

_The door opened and Raelle scrambled to sit back next to Scylla with her back to the wall._

_“Up,” one of the men commanded and Scylla got to her feet with a significant look to Raelle who did the same._

_The black bags were thrown back over their heads and they were led back to the truck where they were unceremoniously thrown inside. The engine started and the truck rolled for some twenty minutes or so. Scylla guessed they had traveled maybe 10 clicks at the speed they were going._

_They didn’t remove the black bags this time, instead they were forced to exit the truck bed by the guidance of the butt of the rifle._

_They were forced to their knees just outside the truck and the bags were ripped from their heads. It was still the dead of night. The stars were out in full, painting the sky above them. The moon was held up in the sky and illuminating the men in front of them much like it had the night they hiked into the Tarim camp._

_It would have been reassuring given different circumstances. For now, the men stood in front of them, pistols pointed at each of their foreheads. Scylla noted the safety still firmly in position from where she was kneeling and relaxed infinitesimally._

_“We could kill you right here and be done with this,” the man with authority from before spoke and Scylla was glad Raelle didn’t speak Arabic._

_The man moved his finger to switch the safety off, the other man doing the same and Scylla felt her heart kick up._

_They wouldn’t._

_The loud sound of two guns firing went off and Scylla closed her eyes hard at the sound of it, flinching forward as her ears reacted to the noise. She felt no pain and frantically looked to Raelle at her side who was hunched forward, but showing no signs of being injured. Scylla’s left ear rang and she realized they must have shot over their shoulders._

_A warning shot. How cute._

_“But, instead, we will let the desert decide if you should live. And if you do, you know the message from the Camarilla,” he said, gesturing for the others to lower their weapons and walk back to the truck._

_The red brake lights of the two trucks were far in the distance when Scylla finally let out a breath and turned to Raelle._

_“Are you good?” Scylla asked unable to control the volume of her voice as she turned to Raelle._

_“Yeah, can’t hear shit in my right ear though,” Raelle yelled back at her, bringing the offending ear to her shoulder and rubbing it on the fabric there._

_Scylla reached to the inside seam of her pants and carefully picked a thread there. She pulled the thread away and felt the cool, thin metal beneath her fingers._

_“Is that a knife?” Raelle shouted at her, noticing the movement._

_“I believe the correct question is: is that a knife in your pants or are you happy to see me?”_ _Scylla replied, focusing on not dropping the thin and short object as she began to saw at the zip ties that still held her wrists captive._

_“That was a good one and you know it,” Scylla said as Raelle rolled her eyes. Scylla’s hands broke free and she turned to the blonde and reached for her bindings._

_“So, I take it we’re in the middle of the desert then?” Raelle said, a flash of a smile in thanks as Scylla broke the ziptie. She rubbed at her wrists as she got to her feet._

_Scylla frowned, sweeping the horizon before noticing a slightly brighter spot to the far edge and pointed it out. “There must be a village up there. That’s probably our best bet.”_

_Maybe this wasn’t going exactly to plan, but since when had she needed a plan to make things work? Scylla smiled over at the blonde who grinned back as the two began walking west across the uneven sand in silence._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dun, dun, dunnnn. Welp, what do y’all think? I really struggled writing this chapter and then it sort of all just spilled over and became super long. Anyone else think Tally deserves a never-ending hug and someone to tell her she actually is brave and strong? I would love to hear thoughts, predictions, favorite parts. Thanks again for reading!


	9. Sandstorms and what had been missing

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Note: no present-time this chapter. Enjoy the flashback ;)

Chapter 9

_Wind whipped past her face, a thick cloud of sand stirring dangerously in the air, obscuring any clear path of sight. Raelle had a hand on Scylla’s shoulder so as to not lose her as she followed closely behind the brunette. Scylla was leading them blindly through the quickly developing sandstorm._

_It fucking figured, Raelle thought, that a massive sandstorm would pop up when they were in the middle of nowhere without any supplies._

_They had been walking quietly beside each other for hours. They had been walking so long that the moon and stars had begun to fade and were being replaced by a very faint, reddish light as the sun began to peer over the horizon._

_They had both spotted the clouds and chosen not to say anything. The angry clouds had begun to move in quickly from the south, large gusts of wind the first sign that this would be a powerful one. It was summer, sandstorms happened especially in the far reaches of the desert where the land was flat with nothing to block the wind that would threaten it._

_Scylla had let out a long breath at the first gust, silently pulled up her red bandana to cover her nose and mouth and tightening the knot to hold it into place. She shared a wary look with Raelle who similarly pulled up her own neck gaiter._

_Neither had anything to protect their eyes. Raelle would’ve killed for her army-issued goggles. Her eyes had quickly become angry and raw at the near constant assault of particulate blown into them._

_Raelle bumped into Scylla in front of her who, unknowing to Raelle, had come to an abrupt stop. Scylla turned back to her, yelling so she could be heard above the wind, “We should stop and wait for the storm to pass.”_

_“Out here in the open?” Raelle shouted back to her, wind howling around them._

_Scylla squinted around them, a hand over her eyes as she looked around. She pointed, “Over there.”_

_Raelle strained her eyes looking in that direction and just barely saw the outline of something. Maybe it was just a wall, but she couldn’t help hoping for more_

_It was better than any other option they had. Raelle shrugged and the brunette returned the gesture before beginning to walk in the direction of the outline._

_The two trudged through the sand with their heads down as the sandstorm continued to bluster about them. It was some five minutes later that they, thankfully, reached what they had seen in the distance. Raelle had never been happier to see four walls and a roof in her life._

_Scylla touched the blanket over the door almost reverently before she forced the door open._

_The noise of the wind cut down considerably as they shuffled in the doorway._

_“People leave blankets to show a place is abandoned, but open for any wayward travelers,” Scylla coughed out, shaking off in the entryway. The surgeon followed suit brushing her shoulders off as she blinked rapidly to rid her teary eyes of grainy sand. She pulled closed the door behind her with some effort._

_As soon as her eyes cleared enough to see, she took in the space around her. It was small. The entryway was on the far right of the single room building. There were two small windows on the side farthest from the door. Raelle could see the sandstorm blowing on the other side of them. There were small breaks in the window panes that let some of the sand blow in from the outside._

_Just below the windows were several crates with blankets stacked on top of them._

_Scylla had made her way steadily toward a small fireplace in the corner. There was wood thoughtfully stacked beside it. Beyond that, there were two bedrolls laid next to each other in the opposite corner with more blankets stacked beside them._

_Raelle coughed involuntarily, forcing some of the dust out from her lungs. Spending too much longer in the sandstorm would likely not have been good for either of them, the surgeon thought, taking this as confirmation when Scylla loudly cleared her throat by the fireplace._

_She coughed one last time into her elbow before making her way to the crates stacked in front of the windows. She moved the blankets aside to find a number of unopened bottles of water. She picked one up and called out, “Scyl,” tossing one to the brunette who caught it still in a crouch by the fireplace._

_“Not bad,” Scylla replied, twisting the cap off and beginning to down the bottle’s contents._

_Raelle did the same, not realizing exactly how dry the back of her throat had been until she started drinking. She heard the striking of a match, small flames dancing from where Scylla had shifted from in front of the fire place to the side where she seemed to have found a small, gas lantern. She lit it with ease, putting out the match with a flick of her wrist and picked it up to walk closer to the bedrolls._

_The blonde continued to sort through the crates in front of her, an eye on the storm outside the window that didn’t seem to be slowing anytime soon. It was a lot safer to be in here than out there while it continued. With low visibility, they might end up backtracking and not even know it._

_She turned as Scylla set the lantern down on the ground and began to kick the two bedrolls closer to one of the walls. The brunette lifted them up to displace sand and dust before grabbing a blanket off the pile and shaking it to spread onto the bedrolls beneath it._

_There was nothing more in the crates beyond water, which caused Raelle to bite down her disappointment. She had just found water in the desert; she couldn’t exactly get greedy about not also finding food._

_Scylla had kicked off one of her boots. She turned it over onto the ground next to the bedroll and sand piled there. She shook the boot out before unlacing the next and doing the same. After, she moved and shucked off one sock at a time, laying them over the boots and wiggling her bare feet with a sigh._

_Raelle walked over to where she had slank to rest her back against the wall and kicked off her own boots before slumping to sit beside her. She dropped two more bottles of water beside the bedroll as she did so._

_Peeling her own socks off and enjoying the freedom it granted her feet, she turned to Scylla who was now thoughtfully sipping on water, looking straight ahead._

_Raelle let out a snort of laughter as she noted a pattern on the brunette’s face._

_“What?” Scylla asked curiously, turning to her, lantern illuminating her face further._

_The top part that hadn’t been covered by her bandana was coated in a thick brown that was very distinctive from the rest of her face and quite smudged. There was some dried blood running down from the cut on her cheek. Dirt colored all of her clothes, coating them in a reddish-brown color._

_“Desert chic, it’s a good look on you,” Raelle said around a low laugh._

_Scylla grinned, shaking off like a dog and sending dust everywhere. Raelle coughed again at the newly freed dust, batting at the plumes of it with her hands in an effort in futility._

_“For the record, desert looks good on you too,” Scylla brought her shoulder to bump Raelle’s and the two grinned at each other for a beat too long._

_Raelle was the one who broke eye contact when she cleared her throat and reached for one of the smaller blankets in the stack beside them. She splashed some water onto it and held it up to her face rubbing some of the dirt she was certain was there free before using it on her hands and offering it to Scylla to do the same._

_Scylla took it and began to wipe haphazardly at her own face. She only seemed to be spreading the dirt lines around instead of cleaning it off. “What?” She asked again, a difficult to read smirk at the corner of her lips. It had Raelle wondering if she knew exactly what she was doing._

_“Come here,” Raelle replied, reaching out for the cloth from her. She wet it again and shifted closer to the brunette._

_Raising one hand, she took Scylla’s chin lightly and used the other to gently brush away some of the dirt clean from her face._

_It really should not have been some emotionally charged activity, but Raelle felt the intimacy of the action amplified by the small, flickering light and the soft, appreciative gaze Scylla had fixed on her. She wiped the dried blood gently from Scylla's cheek with a clean part of the towel. Even in the middle of the desert, she was a doctor, after all. There was only a small cut underneath the dirt and blood. She then used the same portion of the towel to wipe the scrape on her neck._

_She bit her bottom lip and faltered for only a moment before wiping around the corner of the Spree agent’s nose and her full lips with a gentle sweeping motion._

_It wasn’t all that long ago that she had felt those lips beneath her own. Of course, the last time they had kissed, she had ended up with a black bag over her head and an impromptu kidnapping that hadn’t exactly left the best taste in her mouth._

_“There,” she said, softly, dropping her hands and leaning back from the brunette. She felt Scylla’s eyes on her, but couldn’t bring herself to meet them, instead laughing slightly to herself._

_Scylla immediately reached a hand up to her face, feeling for more dirt there and Raelle reached out, stopping her. “No, it’s – You’re fine, I just was thinking about how the last twenty-four hours would be a PR nightmare for the Army to spin.”_

_Scylla grinned, “You mean being kidnapped by a terrorist organization and dumped in the middle of the desert isn’t something you Americans would make a movie about?”_

_Raelle shook her head. “Oh no, we absolutely would. They’ll just never leak a story like this.”_

_“Ah,” the brunette said, adopting a formal tone, “They wouldn’t be keen on the part where you kissed a woman from a mercenary organization?”_

_“And here I was led to believe that you weren’t a mercenary,” the surgeon replied with a teasing grin._

_She supposes she should have known, maybe did know, earlier on why she had been like a moth to a flame around the Spree agent. She had long thought it was the off-limits sign alone that her rebellious nature was drawn to, but now, in a stone hut, in the middle of a sandstorm she realized that she rarely spent more time of her day smiling than when she was with the brunette._

_Don’t get her wrong, Scylla drove her absolutely crazy most days. But she did it in a way that challenged the blonde, with banter that stimulated a part of her she hadn’t realized she even wanted stimulated._

_When she had finally escaped her small hometown, she began to date with a vigor for the years she had missed out on being in the conservative south. She went out with older women who were already established in their careers, she went out with women her age who were still figuring it all out. She went out with tall women, short women, and women in between. Women with long hair, short hair, hair buzzed close to their skulls._

_She rarely had relationships. She didn’t have time for them, what with being on the move at the army’s whim whenever they dictated it. There had been one girl, Kendra, that she had dated before they had first been deployed. She was kind and soft spoken. Tally had, of course, loved her and Abigail had, of course, not had much to say either way._

_They had parted ways when she was deployed and it had taken Raelle until this very moment to realize exactly why she hadn’t felt all that sad about it. She needed someone who would challenge her and have intellectually arduous conversations with. The grin on her face slowly slipped as she realized that she needed someone like Scylla Ramshorn._

_Raelle looked back up into Scylla’s eyes and noticed they had become transfixed on where her bottom lip was once again caught between her teeth. They flicked back up once she realized she had been caught, eyes darting to look anywhere else in the room._

_The surgeon found it oddly endearing that all of the arrogance she had seen in the months prior seemed to melt away when it was just the two of them._

_She would blame this thought for what she did next. She would blame the perceived shyness of the woman she had seen stare down a member of the Camarilla without blinking just hours ago as she reached out and gripped the bottom of her chin, bringing her eyes back up to meet hers for only a moment. She would lick her own lips and push forward to bring their lips together, chafed slightly by the sandstorm._

_She had been foolish to ignore the spark she felt at even Scylla’s most innocent touch. This, Scylla’s lips pressed firmly against her own, felt like she was going to combust._

_There was no shock or hesitation on either of their parts as they each began to move against each other like this they had done this uncountable times before. Scylla’s hand grasped at the nape of her neck, pulling her closer, inviting her to deepen the kiss. It was an invitation she gladly accepted._

_She moved her hand from Scylla’s chin to rest on either side of her face, brushing the soft skin there with her thumbs. She pulled back for a second and smiled as Scylla’s mouth chased hers when she did. She let out a moan as Scylla quickly deepened the kiss again, stroking the back of her neck._

_Raelle needed more._

_She moved her hands from Scylla’s face to her shoulders, grasping the fabric of the shirt that she was wearing and using it as an anchor as she swung one of her legs over Scylla’s lap. Scylla’s arms encircled her back as she settled. The two finally had to break the kiss to catch their breath._

_Scylla took the opportunity to pull Raelle’s gaiter off and toss it onto the floor, granting her access to the expanse of the surgeon’s neck that she began to litter with open-mouthed kisses._

_Raelle ground down into Scylla’s hips who canted her own up eagerly to meet her. The blonde gasped at the sensation, feeling her center throb with the action. She clung to Scylla’s shoulders as the brunette’s hands slipped down to grasp firmly at her ass._

_Too many clothes, she had the fleeting thought and tugged her own shirt over her head, dislodging some of the dirt that had taken residence in her hair and accidentally flinging it toward Scylla who sputtered as some fell into her mouth._

_“Sorry,” Raelle said with a smile as Scylla waved a hand to dismiss the apology._

_Raelle then stooped down to press a kiss to Scylla’s collarbone, moving aside the bandana and reaching for the knot to untie it. “You know the problem with a bandana instead of a gaiter?”_

_She paused her ministrations, waiting as Scylla released a shaky breath. Raelle looked up at her with a smirk, pulling the bandana free and tossing it beside her shirt and planting a trail of soft, open-mouthed kisses along her collarbone up to her neck, the front of which had mostly been protected from the elements to the edge where its protection ended._

_She sucked the pulse point enjoying the sharp breath in that Scylla took at the action. She leaned back slightly to breathe into the ear she was nearest, “It doesn’t keep the dirt off the back of your neck.”_

_“And here I –” Her breath hitched as Raelle nipped at a place just below her jawline._

_“You were saying?” Raelle asked, a cocky grin on her face._

_“I thought you liked dirty,” Scylla breathed and Raelle laughed._

_“That’s a terrible line,” she said, bringing her lips back to Scylla’s and moving them languidly against hers._

_“No, it’s not,” Scylla pulled back to argue and Raelle raised an eyebrow as she began to pluck one button undone at a time on Scylla’s shirt in a deliberately slow pace._

_Scylla brought her hands up to the clasp on her bra. She rested her hand there, looking at Raelle’s face for permission which she received in a gentle nod. She undid the clasp with one hand. Raelle let the garment fall forward and directed it to the side, continuing her slow unbuttoning of Scylla’s shirt._

_She felt Scylla’s hand slap her hand away impatiently and watched as Scylla quickly slid her shirt and bra overhead in one swift movement._

_“Hasty, much?” She teased._

_“Shut up and kiss me,” Scylla shot back an air of playfulness to her words._

_Raelle laughed, “yes, ma’am,” with mock sincerity, leaning down to meet Scylla and recapture her lips with her own._

_Raelle slowly moved a hand from Scylla’s neck downward to grasp her breast, rubbing her palm along the nipple and causing it to stiffen at her touch. She heard Scylla’s quiet moan in reaction, tugging the brunette’s bottom lip between her teeth lightly before beginning to track down. She pressed her lips to skin as she went, swapping her hand with her mouth and allowing the hand to unbutton the brunette’s pants with some difficulty at the angle._

_“Raelle, wait,” Scylla’s breathless voice pulled Raelle from her pursuit and she moved back up until they were face to face again. Raelle shot her a look of concern. “Are you sure you want to do this?”_

_Raelle looked at her curiously. Wasn’t this exactly what the brunette had wanted for months?_

_She leaned in a pressed a light kiss to her lips in reply. “Yes,” she murmured against her lips._

_The gentle kiss quickly heated up once again, a fire burning in Raelle’s lower abdomen as she rocked her hips against Scylla again causing her to break the kiss and gasp for air. She shook her head as if to try and clear it, “Oh, okay, yeah, just wanted to make sure and I mean obviously I want to do this, but I didn’t want you to think that you had to—”_

_Raelle cut her rambling off with a searing kiss, hearing Scylla squeak out a noise of surprise as she parted the brunette’s lips with her tongue once again._

_“Now that that’s decided,” Raelle smirked, giving Scylla a light shove to fall back onto the sleep mats, still straddling her. She felt Scylla’s eyes on her as she shimmied down, kneeling between her Scylla’s legs now. Sitting back on her heels, she finished unbuttoning the pants._

_Scylla tilted her hips up to aid in their removal as Raelle pulled both the pants and underwear off. Unfortunately, in the process, she accidentally kicked some sand that must have been trapped in the cuff of her pants into her eye. She cried out at the discomfort._

_“Come on,” she said petulantly to no one, rubbing at her eye. She heard Scylla’s laugh and felt a soft hand come to rest on the side of her face as she blinked rapidly trying to remove the sand from her already irritated eyes._

_When she finally felt the eye stop watering she looked down at Scylla who was now bare before her. Her eyes traced from her hips with curves she wanted to worship to breasts heaving with anticipation. She finally met eyes that were looking at her so intently she felt like she might burst to flames just from their focus alone._

_“You are so goddamn beautiful,” Raelle breathed before pressing a single kiss to Scylla’s lips and returning to the task she had been intent on finishing before getting sand in her eye. She maintained eye contact with Scylla as she traveled down her body, using her mouth to chart between breasts, stopping to swirl her tongue around Scylla’s belly button and finally settling between her legs. She stopped there, arching a challenging eyebrow._

_Scylla threw her had back in frustration, “Goddess, never took you to be such a tease.”_

_Raelle bit out a laugh, warm breath directly on Scylla’s center making her shiver. Raelle planted a series of open kisses on either of her inner thighs as she spoke. “You’ve been flirting with me and getting nowhere for months now and you didn’t think I would be such a tease?”_

_“Fair point,” Scylla conceded, “Can you just?” She gestured to Raelle who responded by wrapping her arms around Scylla’s legs, pushing them further apart to open her more, but keeping her distance._

_“Can I just, what?” Raelle asked, haughtily, enjoying watching the brunette squirm above her._

_“Jesus, Raelle, can’t you just –” She choked on the sentence as Raelle pressed forward, tasting her with a grin on her face. “Fuck.”_

_Raelle decided to stop torturing the Spree agent and ran her tongue up through her folds to the place she knew Scylla would be most sensitive. She felt Scylla’s hips surge upwards once she found it and carefully used her right arm to press them back to the ground by laying it flat across her lower abdomen._

_Scylla’s abdominal muscles tensed and eased beneath her hand as she worked her tongue against her, tracing around the area with urgency._

_Raelle felt the throbbing between her own legs intensify as Scylla’s began to softly moan, the sounds echoing about the stone hut. She squeezed her own thighs together before releasing and delving in deeper, pulling back to take a deep breath, inhaling the smell of Scylla that seemed to be a mix of salt, sweat, desert, and something she uniquely her._

_It was not all that long until she felt Scylla tense beneath her. Raelle looked up in surprise as the brunette hit her peak, mouth falling open and eyes rolling back. She continued to soothe the area with her tongue until Scylla had ridden completely through it and then slowly moved back up from her position between her legs back up until they were face to face again._

_She gently pushed some of her hair that had fallen loose from her face. When she opened her eyes, still breathing hard, Raelle gave her a knowing look. “I know I’m good, but that was kind of… quick?”_

_Scylla shoved at her shoulder weakly. She reached out and grabbed the back of the blonde’s head to reconnect their lips where she undoubtedly had to taste herself on the blonde’s lips. It was a thought that made her throb once again._

_It was moments like this where Raelle would laugh at her ten-year-old self who tried desperately to have crushes on boys in their grade that the girls found attractive. She had so much to look forward to, so many moments like this one where a beautiful woman recovered in her arms after she had made her come and she didn’t even know it at the time._

_Scylla pulled back after a moment, “In my defense, there were months of foreplay so that wasn’t really all that fast.”_

_Raelle smiled, leaning back to kiss her once again, “Whatever you say, Scyl.” She pressed her body against the length of Scylla’s enjoying the feel of skin on skin, breast on breast. Her right hand fell back to Scylla’s abdomen. It tensed at the action. Raelle smirked, “I mean, if it was that fast, does it really count?”_

_Scylla looked at her in question and then realization as Raelle swiped a thumb over her bundle of nerves and let the pad of her fingers dip into her wetness, testing the waters. She found heat and slick there and pushed into it with two fingers. Scylla cried out at the action as Raelle began a steady rhythm pressing deeply inside Scylla._

_“Fuck, Rae,” Scylla moaned, tossing her head back and then murmuring something in what must have been Swedish._

_She was incredibly wet, Raelle realized with a sense of pride, as she felt some of the wetness spill onto her hand as she kept moving her hand. She lay the heel of her hand onto the bundle of nerves she had just shed so much attention on and heard Scylla gasp in response._

_Raelle couldn’t help moving against the thigh between her legs at the noises Scylla was making, wishing she had the sense to take her pants and underwear off before they had begun._

_Why had she been fighting this for so long?_

_When she felt Scylla approaching her peak again, she curled her fingers forward slightly and felt Scylla tighten at the movement. She repeated it several times, finally feeling Scylla clench and topple over the edge again. She slowed her pace, feeling the aftershocks of the orgasm rock through the brunette._

_“Dr. Collar,” Scylla started after a moment, eyes still closed, head thrown back and chest heaving with exertion. There was a fine layer of sweat on her skin that made her almost look as if she were glowing in the flickering light of the lantern._

_“If you say a doctor pick-up line right now, I’m kicking you out of this hut,” Raelle warned lightly. Scylla laughed, moving her hands to frame the surgeon’s face. Raelle slid her fingers out of the brunette who sighed at the motion._

_She smiled, “But how would I return the favor if I was out there?”_

_“Well, you have made some exaggerated claims over the months, maybe that would just be testing them out.”_

_Scylla laughed, eyes flickering to Raelle’s lips and back. She gently pushed so their positions were changed with Raelle’s back now on the mat and Scylla laying half on top of her._

_“What kind of claims?”_

_“I believe there were some promises about, and I quote, blowing my mind filtered in there between bad puns about other things being blown if I’m remembering correctly.”_

_Scylla tried for a frown, but was unable to keep a smile off her face. “That doesn’t sound like me.”_

_“It doesn’t, huh?” Raelle questioned. The Spree agent began to press kisses along her jaw. “You really don’t listen to yourself that much, do you?”_

_She felt a puff of warm air against her neck as Scylla pressed a grin there. “Nah, that’s what Byron’s for.”_

_“Is now really the best time to talk about Byron?” Raelle asked._

_Scylla pulled back and gave her a disgusted look. “Okay, we are not going down that path.”_

_Raelle paused for a second, giving Scylla an inquisitive look when that was all she said. “Are you seriously not going to make a joke about going down, right now?”_

_Scylla pulled back from where she had been working along Raelle’s trapezius with her tongue. “What do you mean?”_

_“Did I just catch a pun that you didn’t?” Raelle said with a look of mock shock as realization crossed Scylla’s face._

_“A little busy,” Scylla said undeterred, returning her mouth to a line leading down to Raelle’s breast. She took the nipple between her lips making Raelle jolt her hips upwards. She used her teeth lightly before soothing it with her tongue. She then made her way to the other breast and paid it the same amount of attention._

_Raelle was certain she had been dripping since Scylla let out her first moan and gave a light shove to Scylla’s shoulders to get her attention and communicate the fact with her eyes._

_Scylla looked up, hooded eyes darkening at whatever expression she saw on Raelle’s face. She quickly unbuttoned Raelle’s pants and slid them down her legs. Raelle kicked them to the side, feeling the near uncomfortable throb between her legs intensify at the cool air._

_“What do you need?” Scylla asked her as Raelle impatiently lifted her hips yearning for some kind of contact, any contact. She whined slightly when Scylla used her leg to pin the hip down. Hadn’t she waited long enough?_

_“Fucking – Anything, Scyl, just please,” she said, Scylla keeping her eyes on Raelle as she moved her hand through her folds in exploration. Raelle’s eyes fell shut at the gentle touch._

_“Rae,” Scylla breathed out, warm air telling Raelle she was right beside her. The hand paused and the blonde opened her eyes, seeing Scylla’s face a mere inch from her own. The lantern flickered shadows across the brunette’s face and Raelle breathed unsteadily as Scylla slowly entered her with several fingers from below._

_Raelle could already tell it would not take long and couldn’t bring herself to be embarrassed by the fact. She had almost come seeing the brunette climax alone. She let herself feel every second of the brunette’s careful and intentional actions._

_She tilted her hips to meet the agent’s hand, moaning with the angle change that it brought. She was aware she was probably making sounds any of her unit would make fun of her for the rest of her life for, but didn’t want it to stop. She couldn’t have it stop._

_In the far reaches of her mind, she imagined that if the Camarilla or even the army busted down the door for them, they could wait until after she orgasmed. It was only fair._

_Every time she opened her eyes, Scylla was there, watching her with something akin to awe on her face. It was a look that made the burning in her abdomen amplify. There was no doubting that the Spree agent wanted her. She had been wanted before, but this felt different._

_It felt different than any of the other women she had met before her deployment, it felt different than Kendra._

_Good goddess, this felt good. So good._

_She let out a long shaky moan as she felt the fire in her abdomen build. Her toes began to curl as she softly swore, approaching, then falling over the edge. Her vision spotted with the intensity of it._

_Scylla’s pace slowed only momentarily before increasing again with the tightening. Her thumb came up to her meet the spot she was most sensitive and gently began to coax her right back to the edge._

_Raelle felt everything. She felt tears form at the corner of her eyes. She felt her heart pounding like it was trying to beat out of her chest. She felt her ears ringing. She felt the sand and dust on the blanket beneath them, the wind that snuck through the cracks in the stone building, the sandstorm continuing to rage outside, and Scylla beside her brunette placing soothing kisses along her shoulder as she toppled over the edge once again._

_“Fuck,” Raelle breathed out when she finally felt like she had returned to her body. Her arm rest over her eyes and she wiped the tears and sweat that had formed there._

_Scylla lay beside her, a cautious smile on her face. “Was that okay?”_

_Raelle choked out a laugh, coughing again. Scylla scrambled to grab her a water and help her drink._

_“Yeah, Scyl, that was okay,” she replied once she had taken a sip._

_“Just okay?” She asked._

_“Well, I can’t have your enormous ego growing any more, now can I?” She leaned up and pressed a kiss to Scylla’s lips._

_She was overwhelmingly tired now. The previous night’s lack of sleep mixed with adrenaline and culminating in their activities was enough to drain Raelle. She needed sleep. She turned to the window, noting the sand storm still blowing with force outside. She reached for another of the stacked blankets and draped it over both of them, offering her arms open that the brunette happily cuddled into._

_Scylla burrowed her head into Raelle’s neck, sighing contently._

_“This might just be my most successful mission yet,” she heard Scylla murmur almost to herself and smiled. She pressed a kiss to the Spree agent’s forehead before allowing sleep to overtake her._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> * Ducks out from behind curtain * So… what did y’all think…? I’d love to hear reactions, favorite parts, predictions, all the like. It only took us nine chapters to get here so that’s not so bad, huh? It’s been a long time since I wrote a scene like that so I’m hoping y’all liked it. We will get back to the present-day Camarilla op in the next chapter, I just figured this was a flashback that deserved its own chapter and it was certainly long enough for it.
> 
> Thank you all for your kind words, your reviews are so renewing to me. Every comment and kudos that is left makes me excited to post each new chapter to hear all of your thoughts. Thanks again for reading!


	10. Self-sabotage and all that drags in its wake

Chapter 10

“Just so I’m getting this straight, the plan is to infiltrate a village that is likely overrun by Camarilla.” Abigail Bellweather stood with her shoulders squared, her stance wide in front of a large conference table. “That’s the actual plan we have right now? All of that back and forth that had to be purposely in Arabic because I know all of you speak English and that’s the best you’ve come up with?” She asked, wryly, arms crossed in front of her chest. There was a less than impressed look on her face and an angry furrow to her brows. Tension seemed to crackle in the basement of the Spree safehouse.

Byron Rostam was used to tension. He was used to big personalities and bigger egos. Spree Security was a predominantly male organization and because of this ended up being a pissing contest more often than not.

Byron had become accustomed to a variety of standoffs during the years, even expected them. This standoff was very different than the norm for several reasons. The first being it was between a member of the US Army that was technically AWOL and a member of the Spree. The second being it was between two powerful women and not two men.

After their meeting with the Tarim, they had received radio contact from their other team who had also finished their objective. The safehouse had been an even distance between the two, easier than going all the way back into the village to the Spree facility there.

The safehouse was small and unassuming, just on the edge of the village. It looked no different than the houses surrounding it. Byron had led the group into the building after parking their jeep carefully behind the house out of sight.

Adil had been a silent addition to their group. Byron had watched the man in the rearview mirror and he seemed to be spending most of his time stealing shy glances at Abigail who was pointedly staring out her window and pretending she didn’t notice or flush every time she caught him.

It was obvious to anyone with eyes that the two shared a mutual attraction. Byron could already tell that Scylla was bristling at the idea of it interfering with their operation.

She hadn’t said anything, of course, but he knew her well enough. The brunette had been on edge, to say the least. It wasn’t enough for any of their fellow Spree members to pick up on. Byron, though, he knew. He always knew everything about Scylla just as she always knew everything about him. It was part of why they were such good partners.

Byron also knew that Scylla had been keeping something from him. He knew her well enough to realize it had to do with Raelle. He had heard the story she told him. He listened as she described details he would have preferred not to know (it was truly unfortunate there wasn’t something he could use to bleach his memories free from his mind). He listened as she subtly left out what had to be the most important piece.

It wasn’t his place to push. That’s not what they were for each other. They were there and they were patient. Byron could be patient if that’s what Scylla needed.

Spree safehouses were frequently placed in normal appearing houses with some, well, slight enhancements. Byron smirked at the shocked gazes of Tally and Abigail as Scylla pushed aside the large, ornate rug at the center of the room to reveal a trap door with a lock.

Byron felt along the wall, knocking until he heard a hollow return from one of the bricks and peeled it out. In the back was a key that he tossed to Scylla.

Scylla used it to open the lock, tossing it once it was opened to the side. She lifted the trap door with ease, pushing it open to reveal a set of stairs and then wordlessly used a flashlight to descend. From below, lights flickered on.

Byron gestured for Tally and Abigail to go first. He was a gentleman, after all. The two cautiously trekked down the stairs. Byron followed them with Adil close on his heels.

The main basement room was fashioned into a conference room. A large table was at the center with ample chairs around it. There was a closet to the left with heavy-built shelves stacked full with supplies. Three other doors were on the edge of the room.

Behind one, Byron knew, were three sets of bunk beds. Another held a very rudimentary bathroom it did well to not linger near too long. The last had a ham radio and some more advanced communications technology scattered about.

It wasn’t the first time Byron had been in a Spree safehouse. In fact, he and Scylla had been in a number of safehouses just like this one throughout their careers.

Byron went to the closet and grabbed some waters from the bottom shelf. He placed them at the center of the table before going back to the closet for some freeze-dried military rations. They would have to do for dinner, even if Byron did absolutely despise the metallic taste the fruit always seemed to have.

He rested a hand on Adil’s shoulder and brought him into the room with the bunk beds where a dresser of spare clothes stood, mostly untouched for an extended period of time if the dust collecting on it said anything.

He left Adil to change and it wasn’t all that long until the other team arrived. Adil had just stepped out of the room, folding his clothes up and setting them gently upon the table.

He appeared uncomfortable in the borrowed clothes. They were much too big for him. He spent some time tucking the shirt into the pants and rolling the sleeves to make it appear less obvious.

The two teams had shared their intel and after some rapid back and forth in Arabic, Byron had shared the proposed plan with their non-Arabic speaking Army partners.

“Well, Bellweather, what ideas have you got?” Scylla shot back at her, shooting to her feet as Abigail had when she had spoken up.

“I could probably come up with something that’s less likely to get us killed,” Abigail said, snarling at Scylla across from her.

“Okay,” Tally cut in, standing up to put her hands onto Abigail’s shoulders and pull her back with some effort from her stare down with the Spree agent. “This isn’t productive. Adil, why don’t you tell us what you know.”

The man sat straighter. He hadn’t said much of anything since they had picked him up. He spoke, clearing his throat as he began, “I can take you to the village. It is getting closer to night which may work to our advantage. There are people that we trade with there. I know and trust they are not Camarilla, but they will be able to point us in the direction of those that are.”

Abigail scoffed, loudly, as she collapsed into her chair. “This is dumb.”

“You only think this is dumb because your boyfriend – “ Scylla’s eyes narrowed as her voice was calm, even, and all the more powerful because of it.

“Not my boyfriend,” Abigail corrected quietly, pointedly looking at the wall.

“—Is going to have to lead us into that village,” Scylla finished with gusto. “You’re going to have to get over that, if we’re going to get anything done.”

Abigail shot back to her feet, leaning over the table once again. “And what about you, Ramshorn, do you have to get over your feelings about Raelle that have been affecting every decision you’ve made on this op?”

The two women were white knuckled, faces kept mercifully two feet apart by the width of the table in front of them.

Byron and Tally shared a tired look. The other Spree agents were watching with interest. They had never seen Scylla be anything but deliberate and cool.

“The difference between me and you, Bellweather, is I don’t let me feelings affect my ability to do my job,” Scylla bit out.

Abigail snorted out a sardonic laugh, “Could’ve fooled me.”

“Alright, enough,” Tally boomed with a shocking amount of force. “We only have fifty hours left to figure this shit out and I refuse to waste any more of that time watching you two argue!” The two women had enough sense to look properly reprimanded like two children caught with their hands in the cookie jar. “Adil has inside information and we need to use it. He needs to be the one to bring us in. We will have to keep the group small to make certain that we don’t draw too much attention, but we will need backup close in case shit hits the fan. Byron,” Tally motioned for the man to move forward.

Byron liked Tally Craven. She was deceptively strong. She wasn’t in your face about it like Abigail and didn’t exude the confidence Scylla seemed to bathe in on a daily basis. She was a quiet leader who spoke up when she needed to and only then. Byron respected that.

“Okay, team one will stay with me, team two will be on backup. We move out at sundown. For now, grab some food and we will move out in an hour.”

The group scattered, some going to rest in the bedroom, others picking up food from the table and settling in. Scylla had disappeared with the dismissal, seemingly out of thin air. She had probably gone outside to cool down.

“Quite the pair, those two are,” Byron sighed at Tally who had come to stand beside him.

“If we make it through this op without them murdering each other, I’ll consider it a success,” the redhead replied with a rueful smile.

Byron raised a hand to rest on her shoulder, “You should grab something to eat. It might be a long night.”

He then walked up the staircase to follow where Scylla had stormed off.

He found her easily, just outside the hut, feet planted stubbornly in the sand as she leant against it with her arms crossed.

“ _Staring contest with the moon_?” he asked in Arabic, stepping beside her after a moment.

Her face softened and she took a long breath in, holding it, before letting it go. It was a breathing exercise he had taught her.

“We can’t fuck this up,” she replied, kicking sand in front of her.

“I know,” Byron said. He jerked his head back to the hut. “They know.”

Scylla frowned, face scrunching up in concentration. Byron felt like he could read even the most subtle of Scylla’s expressions. This one was like a neon flashing sign, subtlety pushed to the wayside for honesty.

“I fucking hate this, Byron,” she said after a minute.

He nodded, giving her the space to say whatever she needed to.

This was how they operated. One of them would get worked up and the other would stay calm. They seemed to take turns. And if it had been Scylla’s turn more often than not these past six months, Byron was okay with that as he knew Scylla was when it had been his turn in the past more times than not.

She had always been there for him. He would always be there for her.

“Do you remember when you started sleeping with Porter and thought I didn’t know?”

The brunette turned with a curious glance towards him. “Vividly. Why?”

“Obviously, I knew. I was just waiting for you to come to me.” He only had to wait a couple of weeks before she had folded and told him everything. It was only a fling.

Romantic relationships within the Spree were frowned upon for a multitude of reasons. There were, however, no rules against finding comfort or pleasure in each other. Porter had made his interest in Scylla known from their very first meeting when Porter had transferred onto their team from another site.

Scylla had been nineteen at the time. She and Byron had already become close in their time working together. Byron had taken her under his wing and she under hers in their own way. His sexuality hadn’t exactly made him the most popular of the Spree agents. Scylla hadn’t minded.

She had hardly blinked when he casually brought it up one day. Stopping only to make it clear that she didn’t mind discussing men with him as long as he was okay with her also talking about women every now and then. She had said she was a bit of a double agent that way with a shrug and smile that Byron had returned full force.

The new crop of arrivals at the site was a hot topic, even for Byron and Scylla. They both admitted there was something of a boyish charm about Porter. It was in the days that followed that Byron began to understand his initial gut reaction to the man.

He didn’t care for the way Porter looked at Scylla. Didn’t care for the way he overheard the man speaking about Scylla to the others like she was some woman at the bar and not an incredibly valuable member of their team.

Scylla fiddled with her hands in front of her, “I thought you were going to judge me for giving him a shot.”

“I kind of did,” he laughed out.

It was true. He hadn’t liked that she had decided to sleep with the man. He hadn’t liked the way Porter seemed to swell up after it like some balloon that he wanted nothing more than to pop. He hadn’t liked how Porter had told the intimate details to other Spree agents over breakfast the next day.

His best friend was not some prize to be won, she was not some hookup to push out of bed in the morning, she was a person that deserved to be treated with respect and it didn’t seem like Porter was willing to give her any of that.

He spoke down to her in every meeting they had together. He undermined her role in ops they were assigned together. When Scylla had finally come to Byron, sharing what had been happening, he was finally able to approach Porter and punch him in the face like he had wanted to for weeks.

Porter had requested a transfer that same day and from what Byron had heard, he hadn’t lasted all that long in the organization.

“That child didn’t deserve a minute of your time and you knew that as well as I did. You’ve always been very good at self-sabotage.”

“Byron,” the brunette breathed, correctly interpreting the direction he was headed.

“When you’re ready to tell me the whole story about Raelle, I’m here. I’m always here. I always have your back.” He said solemnly, a hand over his heart. Scylla’s eyes were filling with tears he knew she was too stubborn to allow to spill over. “Whatever it is, I’m here.” He paused, smiling at her, “Now then, I can’t imagine killing her best friend is going to help you win any favor either way.”

Scylla choked out a watery laugh. “Not even if she deserves it?”

“No, Scyl, not even if she deserves it,” Byron laughed. He opened his arms and the brunette fell into them. He cradled her head against his chest. They stood there holding each other for some time before Scylla pulled back and said, “Thank you. You’re right that there’s more and I want to tell you about all of it. I just can’t right now.”

Byron sagely nodded, a gentle smile on his face. “We’ve got more details to work on. Hopefully, Bellweather hasn’t started a rebellion without us.”

She would tell him. Byron had faith in that. In her own time, she would tell him. He only hoped it wouldn’t be too late for him to help undo whatever likely brilliant work of self-sabotage she had done this time.

*****

_Raelle was warm, not uncomfortably so. No, she felt warm in a way that made her very much not want to open her eyes. She curled deeper into the warmth, letting out a content sigh._

_Feeling something shift beneath her as enough motivation for her to peer an eye open at the movement. She blinked hard as the world around her came into focus._

_The events before came rushing back to her at the sight of a certain brunette Spree agent underneath her. The two appeared to have swapped positions sometime when they had been sleeping._

_Scylla’s hand stroked lightly up and down her back and Raelle realized she must not be the only one awake._

_“Hey,” she breathed out, lifting her head to meet Scylla’s open eyes._

_“Hey,” Scylla returned, brushing some of Raelle’s hair back from her face._

_Raelle dropped her head back onto Scylla’s chest, closing her eyes again and speaking, “How long were you watching me sleep?”_

_“Hmm,” Scylla hummed out her reply, Raelle feeling it vibrate from her chest. “Only a couple of minutes. You know you snore when you sleep?”_

_Raelle lifted her head up in dispute, “I do not snore.”_

_Scylla raised an eyebrow at her, “How would you know, Rae, considering you’re normally asleep when it’s happening?”_

_“Tal and Abi would’ve told me,” Raelle was certain as she lay her head back onto Scylla’s chest._

_“Are you sure they haven’t?”_

_Raelle thought about that for a moment._

_She distinctly remembers arguing with Abigail about something like this some months ago, but that was after a night of drinking. Who doesn’t snore when they drink?_

_Raelle caught Scylla’s smirk at her pondering and frowned, petulantly replying, “I do not snore,” before burying her face back in Scylla’s neck._

_The brunette laughed, squirming away and Raelle popped back. “Goddess, do not tell me the big, bad Spree agent is ticklish?”_

_Scylla gave her a warning glance, “Don’t.”_

_Raelle smiled as she pounced, fingers flying along Scylla’s sides and under her arms as the brunette laughed uncontrollably, trying to push Raelle off._

_“I give, I give,” Scylla said between laughs, tears leaking out the corners of her eyes. Raelle stopped her actions with a victorious grin, lifting her arms over her head. Scylla reached for one of her arms and tugged her down beside her again._

_She pressed a soft kiss to her lips, both breathing in deeply. “This doesn’t mean you don’t snore.”_

_Raelle’s eyes flew back open to see the brunette’s eyes twinkling with mischief, a smirk firmly in place. She narrowed her eyes at her, before breaking and smiling. She pressed one, then two quick pecks to her lips, pulling back with a grin._

_Scylla smiled back at her, thumb tracing a spot near her chin._

_“How did you get this?” She asked, eyes flicking from the scar on the side of the surgeon’s face back to her eyes in rapid succession._

_Raelle groaned, flopping onto her back beside the brunette on the bedroll._

_“Nope, too embarrassing. We aren’t talking about it,” she said after a moment._

_An amused Scylla popped into her eyeline, “Oh, if it’s embarrassing then we should absolutely discuss it.”_

_“You’re going to make fun of me,” Raelle groaned again, refusing to meet the brunette’s eyes._

_“Try me,” Scylla dared, lacing one of her hands with the blonde’s and pushing against it._

_Raelle let out a long sigh and began with a flurry of dramatics, “So I may have… maybe… ranintoaslidingglassdoor.” She said the last bit in a rambling rush, the words melding together._

_“What was that?” Scylla asked, amusement clear in her voice._

_“Iranintoaglassdoor.”_

_“One more time, for those of us who picked up English a little later than the others?”_

_“I ran through a sliding glass door.”_

_“That’s how you got this scar?” Scylla asked, grin stretched widely on her lips. She used her free hand to trace along its edges again. “How old were you?” At the look Raelle was giving her, she coaxed. “What? I’m trying to picture it.”_

_“I was six and not exactly all that coordinated. My mom had just cleaned the door and,” she added emphasis on the word, “we usually left it open.”_

_“So, you’re telling me that you ran through a sliding glass door because it was clean?”_

_“Don’t laugh,” Raelle instructed, burning bright red._

_“I’m not,” Scylla defended, “It’s just,” she paused, a lightness in her eyes, “They have entire engineering teams that try to keep birds from running into windows.”_

_“Alright, laugh it up, Ramshorn. We can’t all have badass scars from almost getting blown up like you do,” the blonde said, tracing the outline of a burn on Scylla’s arm._

_“I have embarrassing stories too, ya know. It’s not like I got all of scars from knife fights,” she said, pulling their joined hands up to show Raelle a scar across her knuckles. The blonde ran a thumb along it in acknowledgement._

_“I highly doubt you have any scars from something as embarrassing as running through a sliding glass door.”_

_The brunette laid back, taking their joined hands to her chest, just beneath her collarbone. There was a small pink scar about centimeters long there. Raelle unlatched their hands to feel the contours of it._

_“What is this? Bullet wound from when you helped underprivileged kids learn how to read?” Raelle asked with narrowed eyes._

_“No. It was, and if you tell Byron I told you this story, he will bring it up every chance he can,” the Spree agent warned, wagging a finger in front of Raelle. Raelle settled back, giving the brunette her full attention. “Okay, so Byron and I were on vacation in Italy and we had been drinking –”_

_“As you do,” Raelle supplied, stopping after the look from Scylla. She waved her hand in a gesture to continue._

_“We had maybe dipped a little hard and fast into some Absinthe a tourist had left behind in our hotel. We finished the bottle off then went to a bar down the street. There we met a group of German ex-military who thought they were pretty tough. We got to talking and Byron told them I was pretty good at martial arts.”_

_Raelle’s eyebrows went up._

_Filing that one away for later, she thought, careful not to interrupt._

_“And they were like, yeah right. No way. And I was telling them it was all about the reflexes and you had to be quick to be able to fight well. So, they asked me to prove it. Then, Byron borrowed a bow they inexplicably had in their rental truck and shot an arrow at me from fifteen meters away.”_

_“I’m sorry, what?” The surgeon couldn’t help but asking, more questions immediately popping to mind._

_Scylla raised a finger to stop the questioning, “It was an old gag we would do with some of the other Spree when we got a little tipsy. I guess I hadn’t realized exactly how much the Absinthe was affecting my reaction time and how much stronger of a bow they had. Next thing I know I’m successfully grasping the shaft of the arrow, but the tip is also made its way kindly into my chest.”_

_“Goddess, to be the trauma doc when you rolled in,” Raelle said, imagining the scene of a very drunk Scylla and Byron rolling into the ER, the woman with an arrow sticking proudly out of her chest._

_“Oh yeah, it wasn’t the best vacation ever, but thankfully I did grab the arrow before it lodged any deeper than my pec. On the bright side, two of the tough ex-military men fainted at the sight of the blood. I’d still call it a win.”_

_“If you seriously told me the story about the time Byron shot you with an arrow to try and make me feel better about when I ran through a sliding glass door, you may need to seriously reevaluate,” Raelle deadpanned._

_Scylla laughed, “Oh, come on. Scars all tell a story. This,” she gently traced the scar on Raelle’s chin again, “means you’ve lived. Plus, it kinda makes you look like a badass. Even if you do snore like a cartoon character.”_

_Okay, that was it._

_Raelle pushed Scylla onto her back, climbing on top, tickling at her sides with reckless abandon now. She smiled and laughed along._

_Her hands faltered as she moved down to capture Scylla’s lips with her own. The brunette pushed up against her enthusiastically. It was Scylla’s moan that broke whatever spell the Spree agent’s lips had seemed to put her under and she pulled back reluctantly._

_Still breathing hard, she stayed close to Scylla as the brunette lamented, “We probably need to get going.”_

_“Yeah,” Raelle said, with a similar amount of reluctance, “You’re probably right.”_

_“I usually am,” the brunette smirked, “Things would be a lot easier if you just accepted that.”_

_The surgeon shook her head, planting one more chaste kiss on her lips before standing up and beginning to search for her clothes._

_The two slowly began to dress, finding most of their clothing beside the bedroll. Raelle drank some more of the water from one of the bottles after slipping on her underwear and bra and searching for her pants._

_She noted that the world outside of the hut had seemed to calm from their view out the two windows._

_Scylla tossed her pants in her direction and she slipped them on with a quiet thank you. She couldn’t help her eyes from wandering up the Spree agent’s form as she methodically dressed from the top down._

_“Did you lose your watch?” Raelle asked, seeing the tan line on her forearm that was missing its usual tool._

_Scylla looked down at her wrist as if she just noticed it for the first time, “Oh. Must’ve.”_

_“Good thing Spree can probably tell time by the sun’s position in the sky,” Raelle teased._

_“That’s not entirely inaccurate, although I’m sure you’re trained to do the same,” the brunette shrugged, stepping into her socks and then her boots._

_As much as Raelle would like to deny it, the Spree were incredibly well-trained. They knew how to work with people as seen with the Tarim and they had been working in the region long before the US had built Fort Salem. They had connections and they knew how to use them._

_Raelle slipped her own boots on, tugging the laces tight before straightening up to find Scylla staring at her with a faint smile on her face. “What?” She asked, lightly._

_Scylla shook her head. Raelle picked up her gaiter as the last piece of her clothing. She tossed it over to Scylla._

_The brunette caught it with a look of confusion._

_“Your, uh, neck,” Raelle gestured, “Might need more coverage than a bandana today.”_

_Scylla looked down, eyes following the rather noticeable trail of bruises Raelle had left._

_“You can bet I’m going to get you back for this,” Scylla said, tossing her bandana over to Raelle in exchange._

_“I actually count on it,” Raelle said with a smirk, tying the red bandana around her neck. She pulled up the collar on her shirt after buttoning it all the way up. She knew the sun would be brutal out there._

_They left three waters behind, each taking two with them. It took some force to get the door open as sand drifts had been pushed up against it. The two did their best to keep the sand out of the hut as they closed the door and began walking._

_It was hot already, probably midday based on the sun’s central positioning. Scylla came to a pause once they were a small distance out. There was no helpful light like there had been last night to point them in the direction of the nearest village._

_They had walked slightly to the right to get to the hut if Raelle was remembering correctly. She pointed straight ahead with a shrug. The brunette nodded and they set off._

_They walked in relative silence although it wasn’t an uncomfortable one. They both seemed to realize they had a long day in front of them and that in the heat of the sun it would serve them best to conserve energy where they were able._

_Raelle spent the time carefully tracing back through the events of the last twelve hours. She did her best not to linger on what happened in the hut because the flush that brushed her cheeks at the thought wasn’t exactly helping with the heat._

_She focused instead on what had happened after they had been grabbed. She hadn’t understood all that much of what was taking place in the basement as her Arabic was incredibly limited and mostly food related. She knew the brunette was tracking all of what was said._

_It was when they were sitting and taking a small break some hours later that she decided to ask in between sips of water. “Hey, Scyl?”_

_“Yeah?”_

_“What exactly did the Camarilla want with us? Why leave us in the middle of the desert instead of killing us?”_

_The Camarilla weren’t exactly known for their compassion. Yet Scylla’s reactions to everything happening had been confident and sure up until they discharged the shots over their shoulders. She had known they were Camarilla. She had been the one to tell Raelle as much._

_Scylla shrugged, taking another small sip of water and pushing some of the sand below her feet around. They were both huddled and facing away from the sun although it was a difficult feat given the time of day._

_“Last week, we made a move on an arms dealer on the black market that we suspected of working with the Camarilla. That bomb in Iran a couple of months back? We had good evidence he had sold the supplies to build it. Anyways, he was a scumbag, but very easy to flip. At least for now.”_

_Raelle raised her eyebrows, shooting the brunette an impressed grin, “Y’all flipped a Camarilla supplier?”_

_Scylla nodded, tying her hair back into a messy bun so it was out of her face. “What, like it’s hard?” She said, putting on a very believable American accent._

_Raelle laughed at the movie reference. She jostled, lightly into Scylla’s shoulder who was putting the final touches on her hair. “Come on, though, really. What did you guys do?”_

_“I can’t really share details, but it wasn’t something the US Army would approve of.” She paused for a second wiping sweat from her forehead with the back of her hand. “He was the fifth one we’ve shut down in the last two months. None of them ended up panning out, unfortunately. Then, we flip this guy, and well, message received.”_

_Raelle sat, puzzled by the statement for a moment. She followed the logic. The Camarilla had kidnapped them to send a message to the Spree. But how had they known where they would be? Scylla had told her not to let on that she was Army. If she had, would Scylla be the only one sitting here now?_

_“How did they end up targeting you?”_

_“Joys of being the only woman consistently at our site. It’s a whole lot easier to ID me then any of the men.” She shrugged. “Plus, it’s a lot easier to hold a grudge against me. Men’s egos in this region are particularly fragile when it’s a woman destroying them.”_

_Sure, Scylla was the only female Spree agent Raelle had seen since her deployment. And men did hate when women asserted their power here. There were still some gaps that didn’t make any sense._

_“Okay, so why didn’t they grab you in the village? They came out to the Tarim camp, that just seems risky.”_

_The Camarilla were careful, they were not known to take unnecessary risks._

_Scylla looked suddenly unsettled and stood to her feet, offering a hand to pull Raelle back up. “We should keep walking.”_

_The blonde took the offered hand and they began their trek again._

_Raelle couldn’t fit all of the pieces of the puzzle together yet. The Spree had threatened or beaten up or done something the US Army wouldn’t necessarily approve of to a man they suspected of being a Camarilla weapons supplier. Once this supplier was cut off, the Camarilla wanted to send a message to the Spree._

_Those parts made sense._

_Well, sort of._

_Raelle hadn’t realized the Spree would be interested in the happenings of the Camarilla. Spree Security had always been very vocal about a neutral stance in politics. Then again, the Camarilla were more terrorists than a political faction._

_It still didn’t make sense how they had known to kidnap Scylla from the Tarim camp, even if she was easier to track than the others._

_Raelle thought back to the briefing on the Tarim op. Byron and Scylla had done the primary discussion for the brief. They each took segments to explain. Raelle hadn’t exactly been paying the most attention as she was still stewing in anger at having to go. She had read the information in her packet before the meeting, unlike most of those present for it._

_There was something that Byron had mentioned almost casually that seemed to now hold more importance. Supplies._

_Byron had spoken about how he had mobilized as many supplies from the surrounding villages as possible for this operation in the days leading up to it._

_Spree coming and buying supplies from multiple villages must have sparked some sort of gossip amongst the villagers._

_Spread the word that Spree would be away from their well-guarded and well-surveilled headquarters._

_Then what? What had they done?_

_They had been walking what may have been another hour when she finally asked, “Why were you trying to get me to go back to the fire before we were grabbed?”_

_The brunette’s steps faltered for a moment and Raelle’s hand shot out instinctively to steady her._

_“I don’t remember trying to get you back to the fire,” she finally replied._

_The blonde shook her head, dropping her hand, “You were very adamant about me going back to the fire.”_

_She remembered it clearly. She had kissed her and then ran and Scylla ran after her. They had kissed some more before the brunette had pulled back and told her she needed to go back to the fire._

_Why had she been so clear about Raelle returning there?_

_“Oh,” Scylla said, long and slow as they continued to walk across the uneven terrain, sand slipping beneath their feet. “I guess I just thought you should take advantage of the party that was being thrown in your honor.”_

_Raelle’s eyebrows knitted together at the answer._

_That didn’t exactly make sense, did it?_

_The Spree had offered to run security on the op. In fact, it was one of the few parts that seemed non-negotiable._

_How could an organization that had security in its name be so bad at their jobs that two of the members of the op were kidnapped? Raelle knew well enough that the Spree were good at their jobs._

_There was just no way that the Carmarilla could’ve infiltrated if the Spree had been holding their posts._

_Unless… Unless the Spree let them by or got caught up in the party._

_But that. That didn’t make sense either. They were a well-oiled machine. They wouldn’t make a mistake that allowed Camarilla onto a campsite just because there was a party happening._

_No, Raelle thought. There was… There had to be another explanation._

_Raelle stopped walking. “Why were you trying to get me to go back to the fire, Scylla?”_

_The brunette turned around to look at her. “Raelle – “_

_“No,” she wouldn’t be redirected, “Why were you trying to get me back to the fire?”_

_Scylla paused, shaking her head slightly at the questioning._

_“Scylla,” the blonde prompted, crossing her arms in front of her chest now._

_Had she gotten all of this wrong? Had the trust she placed with the Spree agent been so misplaced?_

_“Please tell me you didn’t knowingly lower defenses to allow a fucking terrorist organization into a peaceful Tarim camp, half of whom are sick.”_

_Scylla paused, sucking in a breath._

_Sudden memories flooded Raelle, the subtle glance at her watch after they had kissed. Her ushering the blonde back to the fire. All the Spree sitting around and enjoying the party. No one was near the tents they had been staying in. No one was away from the party._

_“You knew they were coming, didn’t you?”_

_“Well, technically I had intel that around that time, there was a chance that there may be a group infiltrating the camp. We weren’t all that certain who– “_

_“Since you’d been pissing people off for months now.”_

_“I mean, kind of?”_

_“So, it would have been fine if some other weapons dealer you pissed off came into camp?”_

_Scylla guffawed. “No, it wasn’t like that.”_

_“Then what was it like, Scylla? Explain it to me. Because it seems a hell of a lot to me like you and your organization,” Raelle bit out the word. “Decided that none of the Tarim’s lives were worth more than whatever secondary op you were running.”_

_Scylla opened her mouth to argue._

_Raelle barreled on, “Because there’s no way that you could know that whoever was coming didn’t want to kill or maim or whatever the hell else they could have wanted to do. Doesn’t matter how damn talented y’all think you are, you can’t read the minds of some unknown.”_

_“Rae –“ Scylla reached out to place a reassuring hand on her arm. Raelle slapped it away._

_“You let fucking terrorists into a camp of children and women and I can’t decide what pisses me off more, the fact that you did it or the fact that you don’t think there’s anything wrong with it. Do you?”_

_Scylla blanched, opening her mouth to say something then closing it again, several times._

_Raelle had been a fool. She had been a fool to think a mercenary could be anything more than a mercenary. Mercenaries protected their interests. They protected their investments and whomever got in the way was collateral._

_That’s what had happened to countless others in the past, that’s what had happened to her mom. She had been nothing more than a paycheck to the people who had killed her._

_Scylla was a mercenary. The humanitarian mission she had pedaled to everyone, the mission that Raelle had been eating up like the rest of them, it was all a front for whatever this true op had been._

_And Raelle had fallen for it. She had fallen for Scylla only for the truth to come around and smack her upside the back of her head like she had been anticipating it to all this time._

_And she had slept with her. Oh, Goddess, she had slept with her. How dumb could she have been?_

_Embarrassment flooded her, an uncomfortable flip of her stomach with the realization that she had done this to herself._

_Stupid, Raelle admonished herself, how did you let yourself be so stupid?_

_Raelle opened her mouth to reply and then closed it after a moment. “We need to keep walking.” She said in quiet voice so different than the one she had just used. It was resigned almost, she was resigned. Almost. “Maybe it’s best if we do that without talking.”_

_Scylla looked like she wanted to argue, but chose to nod stiffly instead._

_Raelle was tired and hungry and had sand in places that sand should definitely not be. She would have done just about anything for a cold shower and a bed with fresh sheets in a place far from the brunette. The stark contrast between her feelings in a twelve-hour period made her own head spin and she just wanted everything to slow down for once. Why couldn’t it slow down?_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well…? At least I gave y’all some pillow talk to start out with? I would love to hear thoughts, predictions, favorite parts. We have Beltane to look forward to in the flashbacks. The Camarilla op is also going to be moving along. I loved all of your comments from the last chapter! Thanks for leaving your feedback.
> 
> Thanks everyone for reading, as always!


	11. The futility of being on the outside

Chapter 11

Abigail Bellweather was going to kill Scylla Ramshorn.

Okay, maybe not in a literal sense, but she was certainly tempted.

The ticking clock seemed to be pressing her patience that had already been wearing dangerously thin.

She sighed out through her nose, an irritated noise leaking out with it. She felt Tally’s eyes on her, could feel a warning in the glance. She ignored it.

She knew she was a lot right now. She knew the redhead was doing her best to maintain relations between them and their current colleagues. She knew that this collegiality needed to be maintained for this mission to have any chance of being successful.

She also knew that she and Tally weren’t necessary to the Spree operation. Knowing and accepting were two very different things.

 _“Asset approaching,”_ crackled over the comms.

Abigail brought her eye to the night vision scope on her rifle and swept to the planned entrance of the village. Adil’s form tread on steady feet along the path. He had a small cross body bag on. In it was enough cash to hopefully sweeten the idea of sharing information among those he knew. He would be another traveler passing through.

Abigail did not like this plan. She did not like the idea of Adil walking, unarmed, into a village rumored to be populated with members of the Camarilla. She did not like that he would have no way to communicate with them. She especially did not like that she was one of the teams relegated to the metaphorical sidelines.

After much discussion (read as argument), it was decided that Byron and two other Spree men would be nearest to the action as team one. They would split team two in half and station one team to the side of each of the two main roads into and out of the village.

There may have been a sigh of relief when Byron had paired Tally and Abigail with a rather large, Polish man they called Bralin and had Scylla split with two other Spree members. Abigail wasn’t sure either of them would have survived another couple of hours in each other’s presence. It was best if they had a bit of breathing room.

Byron had likely realized that. The man was very perceptive and seemed more in tune with Scylla than any of the other Spree. It was almost as though they spoke some silent language only the two were fluent in. With a tick of the eyebrow here or a curve of a lip there, the two had accomplished more planning than any of the conversations taking place out loud or so it appeared.

It had been Scylla who, with an almost hesitation etched voice, had shared the belief that Adil wearing a wire may cause him more harm than not. Team one would do their best to keep Adil in eyeline instead and they would have weapons and the ability to communicate with the other teams. Abigail could see the logic in the thought. It did nothing to comfort her nerves about sending him in without comms.

 _If he were to talk with the wrong person or even if the wrong person were to overhear his conversation…_ Abigail didn’t want to finish the thought. She knew having a team within eyeline wouldn’t be enough to stop a bullet from a gun or the flash of a knife. The Spree were quick, she knew that, but those were quicker.

She paused a moment to once again wonder why the man had been so willing to enter the fray for people other than his own. Abigail knew that he was selfless, had seen it in the way he interacted with Khalida and others around him. This was beyond that.

Tally had explained as much as she knew about the Tarim and their value for honor in the Spree safehouse basement while Adil had changed clothes. It had seemed to be more than that. Abigail was searching for the more.

 _Why did it have to be Adil?_ Abigail knew the real reason she couldn’t get past this notion.

“Trust, Abi,” Tally breathed out, causing Abigail to turn to the redhead. She was peering down the scope of her own rifle.

She wished again that she were with Byron inside the village. She wanted eyes on Adil like the man was meant to have. Instead, she was sitting some five minutes away, only able to look down a scope and not actually see any of the action.

She got it. It would raise a hell of a lot more suspicion for women to be traveling alone in this region, let alone at night. They didn’t need the attention. They needed to blend.

Byron and his team were purposely selected because they could blend a lot easier than two white women and one Black woman with a posture that was unmistakably military. No matter how she tried to slouch, Abigail only succeeded in looking mildly constipated and still would be sitting far more upright than any of her companions. She couldn’t help it; it was practically weaved into her Bellweather DNA.

She knew Byron and the rest of team one would be sitting just inside the village, passing a bottle back and forth and speaking jovially. They also would be communicating updates through the comms as Adil infiltrated and hopefully met his contacts.

Abigail felt her heart beating out of her chest. She hated not being able to see. She hated having to be back here.

She sighed again, sliding to sit down with her back to the rubble they were stationed behind.

She was worried about Adil. She could admit that, even though it was difficult. She wasn’t used to being worried about men, especially not ones she hadn’t even kissed yet.

She would worry about Raelle and Tally, but she had never spent all that much time worrying about the men who were deployed with them. It was a part of their job, she reasoned. She knew it was also a part of Tally and Raelle’s jobs too. Her closeness to the two had seemed to separate them from the rest of the army in her mind.

Other men and women died. Not Tally and Raelle and Abigail. Not their unit. Not if Abigail had anything to say about it. And she almost hadn’t.

A brief flash in her mind of finding Raelle among the rubble of the medical building after the bombing.

She had almost lost Raelle. She wondered if maybe that was a factor in her concern about Adil, but knew that would only be lying to herself.

She had gotten very good over the years at separating feelings from pretty much everything in her life. There was a time and place for emotions and the time was usually not now and the place was normally not here.

Even in high school, as her friends fawned over her high school sweetheart’s unwavering affection for her, she felt strangely detached from it. She knew it wasn’t exactly how she should be feeling if television and books were anything to go by.

It all felt so routine and expected. Her parents expected her to date just the same way they expected her to achieve top marks in her classes and make all-state in basketball and track.

Paul had been a part of that. He had been polite and proper and quite good looking if Abigail did say herself. They dated from sophomore year until graduation. It was easy. They never fought. He had always felt more like a good friend than a boyfriend to Abigail.

When he asked if she wanted to get a hotel room after junior prom, she said yes. Her friends had expected it. Paul hadn’t expected anything, she knew that. He would have been just as excited to take her to the dance and drop her back off at home.

But this was a rite of passage, wasn’t it? Like some rom com where high school sweethearts lose their virginities to each other in a hotel room after prom. Like the stories her older friends had told of their junior proms.

It hadn’t been spectacular, not that Abigail had expected it to be. It hadn’t been all that uncomfortable either. She was happy to have shared the experience with Paul. He truly was the best boyfriend a girl could ask for.

The problem was, Abigail hadn’t asked. She was a girlfriend because that was a normal high school thing to do.

And when she enlisted, she broke the news to him that it would be best if they went their separate ways. She wasn’t sure what she expected. She hadn’t expected him to cry as much as he did. There was a part of her that didn’t blame him. She had always had one foot out the door of their relationship and he had always been all in. He deserved someone who wanted to be all in with him. Abigail knew she wasn’t that girl, not for him, just as he wasn’t the boy for her.

She had her fair share of hookups after basic. Her unit knew she had a way with men. Men liked that she was confident in herself. And she was. She knew Paul had a lot to do with her self-esteem and was thankful for that. He had spent a lot of his time building her up, while she had spent most of her time pretending that she hadn’t needed it.

She knew genetics had gifted her a full figure and exercise had sharpened it. She knew her legs were long as they were strong. Objectively speaking, she knew her face and complexion were enviable.

She used this to her advantage. She always made it clear that nothing would come of the hookup before it began. Most of the men were fine with this, preferred this even. Raelle and Tally had teased her some once she explained this, calling her a maneater. It wasn’t said with any malice, if anything both were mildly impressed at her ability to attract men at the drop of a hat.

Abigail Bellweather was used to being the one who was chased. She wasn’t used to yearning. She wasn’t used to actual conversation that wasn’t clipped and only spoken with the intent of getting her into bed. Not since Paul and then it had felt so much different.

Meeting Adil had tilted her world on its axis.

 _“Contact, two men outside a building,”_ Byron whispered along the comms.

Abigail forced herself to take a sip of water. She then, systematically, went over her rifle, making sure it was locked, loaded, and ready for action. The Spree rifles were a slightly different make and model than she was accustomed to. She and Tally had taken the ride over to familiarize themselves with some of the finer details of the weapons.

 _He’s gonna be fine, Abi, he will be,_ Abigail told herself in her head.

Trust was a difficult thing for Abigail. She was fiercely loyal once you had her trust, but earning it wasn’t all that simple. Tally had wormed her way into Abigail’s heart early on in basic. Raelle had taken a bit more time, to say the least. Regardless, there were no other people she trusted more than the two now, except maybe Anacostia.

She trusted Adil. From their first meeting. And that, scared the absolute shit out of her. For a man to have that much power over her? She loathed it just as much as she loathed sitting here outside of the village, waiting for something to go wrong.

 _“Moving away from contact,”_ the update came. _“Now, stepping into a building. We no longer have visual.”_

“What’s the fucking point of them being there if we have no visual?” Abigail muttered under her breath.

 _“How many ways into the building?”_ Scylla’s voice floated over the comms, asking the more logistically important question. She was with team two near the road leading South of the village.

 _“From what we can see, one,”_ came the reply.

They would at least have eyes on the only way in and out of the building. It was a modicum of comfort knowing they hadn’t been able to do true recon in the village without drawing attention to themselves.

Bralin shifted from his near statuesque stance beside Abigail, reaching into his pocket for something before offering it to Abigail. She looked down at what was in his hand. Beef jerky.

She shrugged and said a quiet thanks as she took a piece. He nodded at her, shoving the rest into his mouth all at once and chewing loudly with his mouth open.

Abigail popped her piece into her mouth, instantly salivating at the salty flavor. She really hoped he had it in a bag and not just sitting in his pocket uncovered. Then again, she needed something to keep her mind off what was happening in the village. To keep her mind off what was happening with Adil. Beggars couldn’t be choosers although she hoped beggars could still wish that the fuzz in her mouth wasn’t from the pocket lining of the Polish man.

Gunshots rang out, breaking Abigail from her thoughts as she whirled around and peered down the night scope of her rifle.

 _“Location of those shots fired?”_ Scylla’s steady voice came over the comms again. Abigail traced from left to right, looking for any trace of unrest. The people she saw looked unbothered. No one had scattered, there was no panic.

Yet, there was no response from team one.

 _“Repeat: We need location of those shots fired,”_ Scylla said again.

If that was near Adil, it was probably already too late. Abigail’s heart beat out of her chest. He wouldn’t even have had time to think. Two shots, straight to the chest or maybe to the head and it would be over.

Someone would have to tell the Tarim. Someone would have to tell Khalida. Abigail felt her stomach drop at the thought of the young girl finding out that her brother, the last living member of her immediate family, was no longer living. She would be alone.

Abigail would be alone. Again.

 _“Repeat: confirm location of shots fired or we are coming in_ ,” Scylla spoke calmly and clearly.

More gunshots rang out. Abigail shot to her feet, Tally and Bralin on her heels as they made their way to the truck.

 _“Stand down, just some locals shooting at the stars,”_ Byron’s voice floated out causing all three of them to pause. _“Repeat: all shots fired outside of building with asset.”_

Abigail took a deliberately long breath, but it came out ragged. Bralin walked back to the barrier and resettled.

“You good?” Tally asked, resting a cautious hand on Abigail’s shoulder. Abigail looked down and realized her hand was shaking with some great force. She brought her other hand to hold it at the wrist to stop its shaking.

She nodded. Tally seemed to give her a long and inquisitive look before nodding to herself and moving back to position next to Bralin.

Abigail continued to stand next to the truck, taking a moment to collect herself. She leaned against it, taking a hand to roughly run down her face.

 _Is this how Raelle was feeling stuck back at the Spree facility?_ She wondered, mind now drifting to the blonde who had looked so small in the bed, recovering, miraculously from an explosion that by every means should have killed her but hadn’t.

Abigail wasn’t all that interested in dwelling on the fact that the Spree were part of the reason for Raelle beating the odds so far. If they hadn’t had the facility and equipment nearby and ready, Raelle would have bled out in the desert waiting for a chopper that would be too late. She would have died in front of Abigail and Tally.

Abigail wasn’t going to give Scylla the satisfaction of her admitting that they had saved Raelle out loud. She couldn’t.

There were some facts that Scylla couldn’t explain away. She may have saved Raelle, but she also messed her up pretty good before that. Raelle hadn’t shared everything about what had happened, Abigail and Tally both knew that. Neither asked for more than she was willing to tell them.

Abigail had some ideas about what had happened. Raelle hadn’t exactly denied some of the accusations she had fired off when the two had finally gotten the surgeon to start opening up about it all.

Abigail had never liked the Spree and she had never liked Scylla. She could admit that. Everything that happened with Raelle had confirmed her initial intuition. The Spree and Scylla shouldn’t be trusted.

_Why had she trusted them with Adil?_

_“We have eyes on asset, he’s coming out.”_

Abigail breathed heavy at the message on the comms. He was okay. At least, for now.

Abigail walked back toward the barrier, taking her place back between Tally and Bralin.

 _“He is down one bag,”_ a voice came. _“Presuming this was a positive drop.”_

Abigail looked through her scope again. She couldn’t see anything still.

_“Asset is making his way back out of the village, unmarked thus far.”_

_Come on, Adil, you’re so close,_ Abigail thought.

_“Headed your way, team two.”_

Abigail’s focus shot over to Scylla’s team near the South entrance. She kept her scope trained as she waited for Adil to appear.

It felt like ages before the man’s frame appeared only as a shadow. He was walking at an even pace, maybe three clicks away from Scylla’s team. Abigail followed him, shooting back to make certain there was no one following after him.

Abigail heard her heart beating loudly in her ears, blood pounding mercilessly until she heard the confirmation, _“Team two, we have the asset. Team one, rally with team three when able.”_

Byron confirmed his hearing of the order and Abigail relaxed just a little bit. Adil was out of the village. He was back with the Spree, hopefully unharmed and hopefully with the information they needed.

*****

_You just have to keep walking._

_Scylla had the phrase on repeat in her mind. They had been walking all day. The sun was now starting on a downward trajectory with intent to bury itself beneath the horizon._

_She stole a look at her companion. Raelle was pointedly looking down at her feet, gaze rarely straying farther from them and only to look forward. Never looking to Scylla on her right._

_Scylla figured she probably deserved it. She was still processing how everything that had been going so well had suddenly gone so very wrong._

_The two hadn’t exchanged more than a few words related to taking breaks and restarting since their conversation had abruptly ended. Scylla was trying to not push her luck._

_She was already concerned that they may have made the wrong decision when picking a direction to walk in. She had expected them to make contact with something by now and instead over every hill they ascended, all they came upon was more sand._

_Sand._

_Scylla wouldn’t mind if she never saw sand again in her life. Her feet ached with the strain of the kilometers they had charted today. She could feel an angry blister forming on the heel of her left foot._

_Her left foot had always been just a bit smaller than the right. Sometimes, she would wear two pairs of socks to make up for it. For the most part, it wasn't noticeable. For the most part, apparently, didn’t cover marching an entire day on uneven sand._

_She could feel the tell tale tightening of a sunburn on her forehead that had been unprotected throughout the day. She was certain that Raelle would probably have a similar line when she pulled down the bandana covering the bottom half of her face. She could see the tint of pink from her place beside the blonde._

_They had both purposely been rationing the water they had brought with them. Still, Scylla didn’t need to be a doctor to realize it wasn’t exactly a good sign that neither of them had to pee since they started their trek._

_She was still repeating the blonde’s words over in her head. She was trying to figure out what she could have said differently to get them back to the way things were earlier that morning when they had been joking around with each other, without malice in their words._

_If there was one thing the Spree agent was good at, it was knowing which battles to pick. She didn’t think bringing anything up with the two of them near exhaustion, sunburnt, and dehydrated in the middle of the desert was optimal._

_“Oh, thank fuck,” she heard a raspy voice beside her say and she looked up, seeing the outline of something far in the distance. She prayed it wasn’t a mirage._

_The two began to walk with a renewed sense of purpose towards the outline up ahead._

_There would hopefully be water. Maybe even food. Scylla bet she could offer Spree payment for a place for them to stay overnight. Goddess, maybe even a chance at a bath._

_She had sweat completely through her clothes on their walk and knew the sweet smell of sweat and dirt wasn’t doing her or anyone that had to be around her any favors._

_It was another twenty minutes or so before they began to approach the outline and it thankfully wasn’t a mirage. It was a small village, a trading post, most likely. Villages like this were sprinkled throughout the desert, sometimes buried in the hills and mountains._

_Time seemed irrelevant with an actual goal in sight after walking, what had seemed like, aimlessly in the desert all day._

_The sun continued to set as they approached, only an orange glow by the time they arrived._

_Scylla pulled down the gaiter that had been pulled up her face for most of the day. Raelle had pulled down the bandana beside her. They had hardly made their way into the entrance to the village when Scylla felt a tugging on her sleeve._

_She looked down to see a small child peering up at her with earnest eyes._

_“What can I help you with?” She asked in Arabic, voice cracking slightly from lack of use._

_The small child simply shook his head. Scylla started to walk again, only for the small child to tug again on her sleeve with a small shake of his head._

_“Okay,” she said, puzzled. “I’m sorry, but we don’t have anything to trade."_

_It was common for travelers to carry small trinkets that the children would trade among themselves. The Spree often carried a Spree Security coin that was designed for just that purpose._

_The child began to pull Scylla by the sleeve away from the entrance up one of the alleys._

_“Is this really the best idea?” She heard Raelle’s voice cut through the air as she followed behind her._

_Scylla thought the question over for a minute._

_This kid was clearly harmless. Too small to do anything to either of them. Could he be bringing them to someone not as harmless? There was a chance. But Scylla’s gut told her he wasn’t. Even after the day they had, she still trusted her gut._

_She wouldn’t say that it was her gut that was making decisions to the blonde considering how little she thought the blonde trusted her right now. Intuition was a large part of Spree work. She wasn’t sure the army surgeon would be open to something so unscientific even before their argument._

_The child hurried them along as they weaved between buildings. Finally, they approached a small residence by its appearance._

_The boy stopped tugging on Scylla’s sleeve once they were outside and ran quickly in, calling out. He reappeared a moment later with a rather stern then shocked woman dragging in his wake. Both Scylla and Raelle lowered their heads in greeting._

_The woman looked around before quickly ushering them inside. She pushed aside a rug in the center to reveal a door to a basement. Raelle gave Scylla a look before the Spree agent climbed down the ladder with the blonde following. The woman closed the door behind them, leaving them in darkness momentarily._

_Light flooded the room again as the door swung open and the small boy popped his head in with a smile. He handed them a jug of water and a half a loaf of bread._

_Scylla thanked him, passing the water and bread off to Raelle and accepting a small lit lantern that he handed her next._

_He waved at them before closing the door again._

_The two women were left alone, once again. The light from the lantern flickered and illuminated their sparse surroundings. There were only a couple of rugs on the dirt ground, no other furniture. Scylla sighed, setting the lantern down and sitting on one of the rugs._

_It was a welcome relief from the day of walking. Her legs throbbed and ached. Raelle cautiously took a seat on a rug across from her, wordlessly setting the water between them and tearing the bread in half. She offered the brunette half of it._

_“Are we just not going to talk ever again, then?” Scylla found herself asking, reaching out for the bread._

_“I suppose not,” Raelle replied succinctly, taking a swig of the water and setting it back between them. “You decided we were going to blindly follow a child, I guess we can consider this me deciding we won’t be speaking.”_

_Scylla tore a piece of bread and popped it into her mouth, grasping the water to help wash it down when she found her mouth too dry to work on its own. “Do you think the Camarilla would give us bread and water?”_

_“Don’t know,” Raelle replied, biting into her bread. “If they aren't Camarilla, t_ _hey’ve got us trapped, unarmed, in their basement until the Camarilla can get here.”_

_“They don't work for the Camarilla,” Scylla said and the blonde shot her a look._

_“And you know that how?”_

_“I just do,” she shrugged, tearing more bread and putting it into her mouth before chewing thoughtfully._

_Raelle sank back, bringing her legs out to rest in front of her with a groan. “Do you think asking me to trust you on this is a good idea?”_

_Scylla felt her frustration building. She was exhausted. She didn’t have the patience for Raelle’s petulance. “I didn’t ask you to trust me.”_

_“No,” the blonde said, matter of fact, “you implied it, though.”_

_Scylla scoffed, eyebrows furrowing, “Well, I can’t control what you infer – “_

_“Oh, you can’t, can you?” Raelle cut her off. “You had no issue using me as a pawn in some larger Spree scam – “_

_“You were not being used as a pawn –”_

_Scylla felt her heart rate increase. The intensity of both voices increasing without a major increase in volume. Both had seemed to recognize at least that part of their situation._

_“Oh, really? Then what would you call it? You and the Spree were running another op while the rest of us were oblivious.”_

_“We were helping the Tarim –” Scylla tried to correct._

_"You were helping yourselves and your mission,” Raelle said with force. “You can try to tell everyone that you’re doing humanitarian work, but at the end of the day, you’re just mercenaries – “_

_“We are not mercenaries!” Here they were, back to the old argument. Arriving here had felt like some odd full circle from the teasing tone of the surgeon saying the word this morning._

_Raelle laughed without humor. “Please, you would do anything if I paid you enough.”_

_“Didn’t have to pay you to sleep with me, did I?”_

_Whoops. Scylla hadn’t meant to say that out loud._

_Raelle’s mouth fell open in surprise._

_“Well, that obviously was a mistake,” Raelle recovered, cheeks flushing as she stumbled over the words._

_Scylla felt a surge and couldn't help herself from barreling forwards, “Didn’t seem like that much of a mistake when we were –”_

_“Okay,” the surgeon cut in, raising her hands, “Didn’t I suggest that we not talk?”_

_“Fine,” Scylla said._

_“Fine,” Raelle parroted._

_It was silent for a moment, both women were angrily ripping off and chewing more bread._

_Scylla hadn't been this heated in a long time. She was known on the Spree for being cool and calm. This day or maybe just Raelle seemed to shred that persona to bits._

_“I just think it’s funny –”_

_“You really can’t help yourself, can you?”_

_The door creaked open again, stopping the argument for the moment. A man stepped down the ladder, eyes widening when they fell onto the young women._

_“As-salaam 'alykum,” Scylla welcomed the man in the traditional Arabic greeting. He paused for a moment before returning it._

_“You are Spree?” He asked in a heavily accented English that surprised Scylla slightly._

_“Yes,” Raelle had replied for them._

_The man took this in, nodding to himself. “I help you. You help me.”_

_“We can do our best to help you if you help us get back to our people,” Scylla replied in Arabic._

_The man looked her over. “Camarilla started coming to our village. Once a month then twice a month then once a week. Now, they are always here. They have recruited people from my village for their organization. For those of us that refuse, the pressure continues to rise. I don’t know how much longer we can survive here.”_

_“Then let us help you leave,” Scylla provided._

_“No, no. My wife and I, we cannot leave. It would be noticed. They would find us. But my son. He still has a chance.”_

_That hit. The scale of impact the Camarilla had on the surrounding communities continued to astound. These people were living in fear. They were living in a sort of prolonged agony, waiting for the worst to happen. People that resisted the Camarilla didn’t fair well. That young boy who had so eagerly guided them here instead of letting them wander into the village that, if they were to trust this man, had become entrenched in Camarilla would be orphaned, one way or another in the coming weeks._

_“If you get us back to the Spree facility, you have my word that we will do everything in our power to help your family in any way that we can,” Scylla vowed._

_The blonde surgeon, having not understood any of the conversation after the part in English ,was looking between Scylla and the man with guarded interest._

_The man held out a hand and Scylla stood to grasp it. They shook hands, holding eye contact. Scylla gave him a nod which he returned._

_“I can bring you back to your village when I bring my cart for trading to the market. We will need to wait until the middle of the night to bring you out to it. Then, we will leave in the early morning.”_

_The man then climbed back up the ladder and closed the door once more._

_Scylla felt the blonde’s eyes on her. “You said you didn’t want to talk.”_

_“It’d be nice to know what the fuck is going on.”_

_“Maybe the army should teach you Arabic.” Scylla paused, knowing this wasn’t helping anything, but unable to stop herself from the quip. She sighed. “He will sneak us out of here and into his trading cart in the middle of the night then bring us back to the Spree facility on his way to the market tomorrow morning.”_

_Scylla purposely left out the information about taking on the safety of the little boy, of finding him a new home. She didn’t think the blonde would want to hear it. She certainly hadn’t needed to._

_Raelle shifted and laid down, crossing her arms over her chest and closing her eyes, clearly with the intent of trying to get some rest before they would be woken._

_It wasn’t all that bad of an idea. Scylla struggled into a comfortable position on the cold, hard ground with only the rug acting as the thinnest of barriers._

_She thought of the bed roll they had rest on earlier in the day. She thought of the blonde pressed beside her, offering warmth._

_She pushed that thought away as quickly as it had come._

_Survival first, reconciliation later._

_Just as she was about to fall asleep, her eyes flew open at the realization: Ah, fuck. She was going to have to buy so many drinks for Byron at Beltane and he was never going to let her hear the end of it._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well…? Thoughts? Predictions? Favorite parts? Next chapter is Beltane in the flashbacks. We got a peek into Abigail’s complicated mind again. Still more action coming up. Thank you all so very much for reading and for those of you that regularly leave comments or have dropped a comment at all, I can’t tell you how much joy they bring me. Kudos, comments, and views make the fanfiction world go round and I feel like I’ve been spinning with your support.


	12. Guilt and the origins of purpose

Chapter 12

Scylla Ramshorn was only ten-years-old when she discovered exactly how cruel other people could be. She was used to being the new girl. She was used to having to navigate new social hierarchies in new places. She was used to the stares and the whispers.

Most of her time spent being the “new girl,” so to speak, had been before she was eight. Now, she was ten and met with something other than the usual muted curiosity she had come to expect.

In the past, she would be introduced and take her seat. One or two of the kids sitting near her would give a hello and she would be in. Children were always faster at friendships than adults and Scylla appreciated that sentiment even now.

In a lot of schools, there were hardly ever any new kids so Scylla was passed about much like a shiny new toy. She didn’t mind. She knew the fascination would die down, as it always did, and she would be just another kid in the classroom until the Ramshorns moved once again and the process started all over again.

The first less than warm welcome Scylla Ramshorn had received was by a welcoming committee spearheaded by none other than a four-foot-five-inch-tall blonde with her hair in perfectly plaited braids. Not exactly what anyone would envision for a first nemesis. Instead of the open, and oftentimes shy, arms that had welcomed her in the past, Astrid Nilsson greeted Scylla with a strong helping of animosity.

When she had gone home after that first day, Scylla had run over the day's events trying to pick out what she had done wrong to make the girl glare at her all day. Maybe she had taken a seat that one of the girl’s friends used to sit in. Maybe she had said something the blonde didn’t like. Maybe she just wasn’t a fan of brunettes. Astrid’s friends all had golden blonde hair like her.

When it came down to it, years later, Scylla’s mind would sometimes drift back to the situation and at one point she had realized, with a clarity that only hindsight and the wisdom of growing older could bring, that the girl had probably been jealous.

Scylla was new. She had just moved back to Sweden after living for a year and a half in Egypt with her parents. The kids in her class, many of whom had never left Scandinavia, had understandably wanted to know more about Egypt and the girl who had lived there. When the classroom’s metaphorical spotlight had swung abruptly onto Scylla, in turn it had left Astrid Nilsson, who was used to the light’s warmth, out in the dark.

Astrid was an only child. She was the center of her parents’ world and had often been at the center of her classroom. Her parents were wealthy and made certain those around them were aware of it. From the flashy sports car her dad drove to the pristine and expensive clothes her mom wasn’t caught out of the house dead without. The youngest Nilsson had followed in her parents’ example when her expectations of those around her grew and her expectations for herself remained level.

Her birthday party the year before Scylla arrived had involved an appearance by The Wiggles who had been paid handsomely and flown in from Australia on the Nilsson private jet for the appearance. The year before that had brought an exotic petting zoo to the Nilsson’s backyard with imported tigers and snakes and a giraffe that definitely broke some Swedish laws and likely required a bit of palm greasing with Swedish customs officials to achieve.

The parties were exorbitant and the gift bags they gave out to each kid often had electronics that hadn’t been released to the public yet thanks to one of Mr. Nilsson’s associates from Japan who had a connection at Nintendo. It was all the kids at school talked about for the weeks leading up to and the weeks after the event. Everyone wanted an invite. Normally, everyone in the class got one.

It wasn’t as though the Nilssons couldn’t afford it. Except now, with her class size growing, the number of attendees limited the activities they could do.

This year, Astrid wanted to take a trip to the Paris and the Nilssons couldn’t very well rent a commercial jet to fit all of the kids. Well, they theoretically could, but Mr. Nilsson thought it important for Astrid to start to make decisions on her own. He also maybe didn’t want to be responsible for an entire class in a foreign country. Of course, he hadn’t mentioned that to Astrid when he explained how she was growing up and ready for more responsibility.

The kids in the class had all heard about this important change to the normal party planning in the leadup to Astrid’s birthday with an expertly leaked piece of information from Astrid to one of the chattier kids in the school. Since then, Astrid had held even even more power of influence over the kids in her class.

If wealth were a weapon, Astrid had learned to wield it at a young age under the tutelage of her parents.

Scylla, on the other hand, was far from wealthy. The Ramshorns got by. Scylla knew her parents weren’t as interested in the number of commas in a salary as the satisfaction of the job. She had always appreciated that. Her parents loved what they did. It was difficult and they never hid that they struggled with aspects of their work, but they did love it.

Scylla didn’t mind that her clothes were used, that the apartment they stayed in was tiny and the electricity sometimes shorted out while she worked on her homework. She didn’t mind that she had to walk the couple of miles to school each day since her parents didn’t have a car. She didn’t mind any of that, hardly even thought about it. She noticed the differences between her and some of her classmates and accepted them with an innocence only children possess.

She had walked into the classroom in a worn, second-hand sweatshirt with a small grin as the teacher introduced her as coming to them from Africa (Scylla had tried not to roll her eyes as the woman referenced the entire continent and not the actual country they had been in. Scylla’s parents had told her that some people just didn’t know better. Scylla reasoned that they could know better, they just chose not to despite the pointed redirection attempts by her parents). When the kids found out it was Egypt, they immediately asked if she had been to the pyramids (they had) and if she had seen anyone mummified (not yet).

Astrid was too young to realize the kind of friendships that were bought were hardly sustainable. All she saw was everything she had being pried from her fingers by the new girl. So, she did what kids do when they don’t understand something. She acted like a jerk.

She made fun of Scylla’s clothes, her accent (she had been speaking more Arabic than Swedish for the past year), her hair, and her name.

It was the first time she realized her name was anything out of the ordinary. It was her name. Just like her family’s station in life, she had noticed the difference and accepted it without question.

Until now, when a ten-year-old bully scathingly told her she was named after a sea monster. She hadn’t wanted to believe it. She stubbornly wiped off the tears that fell as she walked home that day.

When she dumped her bookbag to the ground with a little more force than normal, her dad had walked over to take a seat next to her. In one hand was a chocolate chip cookie, the other a hot chocolate. She had given him a watery smile and said thanks as she accepted both.

He hadn’t pushed. Alice Ramshorn, on the other hand, hadn’t been quite as patient.

When she returned home from work that evening, she knocked on Scylla’s door and pushed into the room. She took one look at Scylla before silently opening her arms for her daughter. Scylla fell into them, the tears she had pushed aside earlier flowing freely again.

She cried into Alice’s shirt, wiping her nose on it in a way that only a parent could accept.

Finally, she told her. She told her about Astrid and how she hadn’t been very nice to her since her first day. About how she had been getting meaner and that the other kids didn’t want to play with her because Astrid told them she had Egyptian cooties. About how Astrid was taking some kids to Paris for her birthday and already announced to most of the class that Scylla wouldn’t be one of them. About how Astrid told her she was named after a sea monster.

“And she must be lying but—” Scylla began only to stop talking at the look on her mom’s face. She began to wail because apparently, she had been named for a sea monster.

When her mom had gotten her calmed down, she launched into a full explanation about where the name had come from.

Her parents had struggled to conceive. She knew this part already. They had eventually agreed that if it happened then it happened, but they weren’t going to waste years of their life making it their sole purpose.

Their work was important to them. They could be fulfilled without offspring; they had always found the thought of deriving purpose in one’s life from childbearing alone to be antiquated.

The years slipped by and it became more apparent that it probably wouldn’t happen and that was okay.

If Alice were to really think about it, which she admittedly didn’t do all that often, she would usually drift back to Pakistan where she had taken a stray bullet in the belly. They had to remove one of her kidneys in an operation that left her with a large scar down the center of her abdomen. Liam Ramshorn had always treated the scar with some kind of reverence as it had been part of what saved his wife from the bullet.

Alice was thirty-six and the Ramshorns were working in Syria when Alice felt a pinch of pain in her abdomen that grew and doubled her over.

Liam had to talk his stubborn wife into going to the doctor as she kept dismissing the pain as something she must have eaten. He knew it was something more and maybe she had too because she allowed him to corral her to the nearest hospital without much of a fight beyond the initial dismissal.

It was some six hours later that Alice Ramshorn awoke with a hazy memory of the events of the previous night. Her husband was at her side to tearfully recount all she had missed.

She had an ectopic pregnancy. Tubal. It had ruptured and she had been bleeding, almost to the point that she hadn’t made it. They had to do an emergency surgery and remove her fallopian tube to save her.

She had made it. She was still alive. She was thankful for this while still mourning the pregnancy that never could have been.

The next morning the surgical team rounded with the lead surgeon. The large group stepped into the room all in white coats with stethoscopes around their necks. They were talking about Alice as if she weren’t there. Finally, they turned and one of the younger men asked her how she was feeling.

The lead surgeon, gray hairs speckled in his beard and wrinkles around his eyes showed his age, cut in before she could answer.

Her eyes narrowed. She instantly didn’t care for the man. He held himself with the arrogance of a man that hadn’t been questioned for some time.

He told her, in no uncertain terms, that she should not try to have any more children. They had wanted to, advised it even, but her husband hadn’t signed off on them ligating her other tube during the surgery.

Alice looked to Liam in surprise, confirmation apparent in his features.

They had found a lot of internal scarring that made it all the more likely that she would have another ectopic.

Liam asked how long they should wait. The doctor had given him a long look, laughing slightly as he uttered, “At your age, you would do better to sail between Scylla and Charybdis than to try again.”

The condescension bristled Alice and Liam. The surgeon’s terrible bedside manner aside, the words weighed heavily on each of their minds.

Both were familiar with the phrase. Greek mythology had been a side hobby of Alice’s since she was a child and enchanted by the stories of a world that seemed so much larger than the one she lived in.

When she grew older, she went out into her world and discovered it didn’t need to be filled with gods and goddesses to be expansive. She traveled like Odysseus, finding a partner in Liam that was better than any of the epic romances she had dreamt of when she was a child.

The doctor had rudely delivered a line that was to mean that if they tried again, they would be stuck between two dangers, both equally threatening. She could have an ectopic pregnancy from being one fallopian tube down and the scarring and even if she didn’t have an ectopic, it would be a high-risk pregnancy given her age.

It was with determination that Alice became pregnant and she gave birth to Scylla at the age of thirty-seven. They called it a geriatric pregnancy. Alice had lay with Scylla sleeping peacefully on her chest just an hour after the delivery and looked up to Liam and said, “Well, I guess we chose Scylla this time.” Her name was a testament to how they had survived the advanced age pregnancy, successfully sailing between the two dangers by embracing one.

Alice Ramshorn explained to her daughter that men often labeled things they didn’t understand as monsters. Even more often, they labeled, strong, powerful women as monsters.

She had been named Scylla because her parents knew that she would be strong. They knew that she would influence the decisions of others around her. Her very existence was proof that when choosing between two near impossibilities, you could find the possible.

Scylla went back to school the next day with her head held high. She was strong. Astrid just didn’t understand. And if she maybe started calling Ass-turd in her head when thinking about the girl, that was just for her and she was ten after all, give her a break.

Part of Scylla’s job with the Spree was to make the impossible possible. She was responsible for thinking five moves ahead of her actions at all times. Her decisions impacted others. She bore the weight of that responsibility every day.

She still had some of the same uncertainties as that ten-year-old girl. She had done her very best to push them down far enough that no one could reach them. Abigail Bellweather, however, seemed to know exactly how to get to them and bring them to the open.

She admitted she could see some of the similarities the woman shared with her ten-year-old tormentor. The main of which being that she had hated Scylla from their first meeting and Scylla hadn’t been all that sure why.

She couldn’t exactly paint this one off as jealousy. This was more intricate in a way that most adult relationships are. She knew that part of the loathing was because of Raelle. Of course, the blonde hadn’t even been in the same time zone when they first crossed paths so it couldn’t be the entire explanation.

Abigail seemed to be cut of a similar cloth as Astrid. She walked with a regal posture only the elite seemed to be born with. It hadn’t taken much time at all for Scylla to uncover the long line of Bellweathers that had come before her. She supposed that was where some of the arrogance came from.

She had heard stories from Raelle that explained facets of Abigail that she hadn’t anticipated. As much as she didn’t want to admit it, they had a number of things in common. The most obvious being that they both masked worry with purpose.

Scylla was worried. Had been as she sat on the sidelines as the Camarilla escalated their dispute with the army. Then the bombing had happened and Scylla felt like she hadn’t truly slept since.

Every moment she spent with her eyes closed, she spent reliving the sight of Raelle’s bloody and motionless body being lifted to the back of a Spree truck with rubble around them. Her only comfort was knowing the blonde was safe.

For now, at least.

This mission had meaning. It had meaning beyond the surgeon who haunted Scylla’s every thought and the weight of that laid heavy on her shoulders. She couldn’t mess this up. She knew that. She certainly didn’t need Abigail Bellweather reminding her of the fact at every turn.

She had felt her frustration mounting at a pace much faster than normal and knew her lack of sleep wasn’t helping matters. She seemed to take every scrap of bait the army sergeant tossed her way. She had seen the same guarded desperation she was sure would be found in her own eyes if she were to look in a mirror reflected in Bellweather’s. Abigail had the added time limit to her involvement in this op and Scylla understood that had to exacerbate every bit of this.

They had a location. They had a safehouse that was meant to have higher ranking Camarilla officials in it. Right now.

And it was thanks to Adil who had flawlessly, if not in a nerve-wracking way, executed his role. Scylla’s heart had dropped when the sound of gunshots rang out. She worried immediately that she had been wrong, that this hadn’t been a good idea.

She wasn’t used to second guessing herself. She wanted to blame Abigail for that, but knew that was an oversimplification. Sure, Abigail played a part in it, but she wasn’t the sole perpetuator.

Byron’s team not immediately responding could have meant a number of things. Maybe they were investigating the shots or maybe they were being talked to by villagers and couldn’t subtly access their comms. Scylla’s mind immediately ran to the worst-case scenario with Adil dead in whatever building he had entered and their chance for information gone with him.

It was with relief that the voice had crackled back informing them it was locals shooting into the air. It was more relief when Adil emerged from the village seemingly unharmed. He walked with an easy pace to their team, giving an encouraging nod and smile as he approached.

He had done his part. Scylla had offered to have a team drop him off close to the Tarim’s location so he could return home. She was only mildly surprised when he declined. He wanted to see this until the end.

Scylla was certain Abigail would find a way to blame her for the decision. She pushed aside the thought. It wasn’t productive. Then again, a lot of her thoughts hadn’t been productive since that night.

They rallied at an agreed upon location with the other team, Adil accepting a hug from Abigail as soon as he had exited the vehicle. She shook her head and caught a blip of amusement in Tally’s face.

It was a moment of rare vulnerability from the army sergeant and Scylla didn’t feel like pushing her luck by commenting on it out loud. Scylla Ramshorn was many things, of these, a fool she was not.

After the two had separated, Byron had moved beside Scylla and nodded towards Adil to share what he had learned.

After he had finished, Byron waited a breath before meeting Scylla’s eyes. She shook her head minimally and then gave a nod. He nodded in return.

“It would be best to move tonight while the information is still fresh. We will have to park a distance away and hike in so our movements don’t alert them to our presence. We will need two people to drive the jeeps back and await our signal to pick us up after.”

Byron pointed out two of the Spree men who agreed.

“Let’s head out then,” Scylla said, anxious to get moving. The Camarilla moved quickly. She didn’t want to miss this opportunity.

“Who’s going to take Adil back?” Abigail asked.

“I’m coming with,” Adil asserted and Abigail swung to face Scylla, ready to unleash some likely less than kind words until Adil lightly grasped her arm. “It’s my decision.”

“Adil, you just went above and beyond in that village. You should go home, back to Khalida.”

“I should be where I am needed. I know the area better than everyone here. I can make sure we don’t lose our way.”

Scylla could see Abigail struggling with a rebuttal and spun to walk back towards the jeep, the others following her. It was another couple of minutes when first Adil then Abigail slid into the back seat of the jeep. Adil was wearing a placid expression whereas Abigail’s face was painted with murderous anger.

Scylla snorted making Tally and Byron smile before Byron started the jeep and they were off to the next piece of this mission.

Scylla felt like she was sailing. She only hoped she was choosing the right danger to sail closer to.

*****

_“Can I just take a moment to say that we look absolutely fantastic this evening?” Tally closed her eyes as she spoke, raising her hands up in a mock seriousness that caused her companions to laugh, one a bit more reluctantly than the other._

_It was Beltane and try as she might to get out of it, now having what she had thought was an excellent excuse of emotional trauma from being kidnapped by the Camarilla, Raelle Collar was still on her way to the village’s’ annual festival._

_The last week and a half had been a whirlwind of kinds. She and Scylla had been snuck out to the man’s trading cart in the early hours of the morning after broken sleep in his basement. Raelle had done her best to ignore the closeness that the cart required for both of them to fit alongside the goods the man would be trading that day. They were under a blanket, which didn’t exactly help as every breath each of them took warmed the air surrounding them._

_Raelle had never been a fan of small spaces. She likened the fact to her feelings of claustrophobia within her own hometown. Being caught under a blanket with a woman she would have preferred to be miles away from wasn’t exactly topping the list of her experiences in the desert._

_They had thankfully navigated without problem to the village and the man had dropped them off in an alley. The surgeon had watched as Scylla tried to come up with something to say, but she wasn’t having it. She wanted a shower, a nap, and more than anything else to be away from the Spree agent._

_She turned on her heel and began to walk for Fort Salem, quietly thankful that Scylla hadn’t trailed after her._

_Raelle was greeted with equal parts confusion and relief at the gates of Fort Salem. She had looked a little worse for the wear and it took the gate guards a second to recognize her and lower their weapons._

_She had been escorted to a room where Anacostia and Dr. L’Amara were anxiously waiting. She quickly assured both women that she was fine other than being in dire need of a shower and some clean clothes._

_“Collar, I swear to goddess, you’re going to put me in an early grave one of these days,” Anacostia had said when she finished recounting as much as she felt comfortable sharing with the army about what had happened since she was taken. “We’ll need all of this in a written report by tomorrow after. For now, you’d better get back to Craven and Bellweather before the two shake down the whole countryside looking for you.”_

_Raelle frowned at that. She hadn’t thought about what might have been happening back at base while she was missing. She felt a wave of guilt flush through her body as she considered what she had been doing for part of the time her best friends had been worrying about her._

_“The Tarim op?” Raelle asked Dr. L’Amara as she stood up to leave._

_Dr. L’Amara smiled at her, “We have an enforced security detail out of sight. They are due to finish tomorrow. From what I’ve heard, other than a surgeon going missing the operation has been a success.”_

_Raelle let out a sigh of relief. She was glad the army hadn’t pulled them out as soon as her disappearance surfaced. It wouldn’t have been fair to the Tarim. At least Scylla and the Spree’s reckless decisions hadn’t sabotaged that._

_She trudged back to the barracks wishing she could stop at the showers before stopping in her room knowing Abigail and Tally would make her recount every event once she saw them._

_She was pleasantly surprised to find their room empty. She quickly collected everything she needed for the shower and made a beeline to the showers ignoring the stares of other soldiers at her rugged appearance as she did._

_She peeled her clothes off outside the shower, dirt falling to the ground as she shrugged out of her boots then pants. She considered and ultimately did toss the underwear into a trashcan nearby._

_They probably would have washed up fine, but she wasn’t sure she would have been able to separate the memories of that small hut and the garment._

_She untied the bandana and stared at it for a second. She looked to the trash and back to the square fabric in her hands. It was worn, cared for. She ran her hand along the small amount of blood that must have accumulated on the bandana from the cut on Scylla’s face and neck._

_She couldn’t bring herself to throw it away. She would wash it and return it and that would be the end of it, the end of whatever the hell they had before Raelle had connected all the pieces of the puzzle._

_She set the bandana down on the pile of her other clothes and went to turn the shower nozzle. She allowed the water to warm before stepping into the spray. She felt the tell-tale prickle of sunburn on her face and in her hairline. She had anticipated this from the heat and slight throb she had felt from where the bandana hadn’t covered._

_She let the warm water wash the past few days off her skin. She was sore. From the walking and the… well, not walking that had happened in the hut, she supposed she could admit as well. Raelle didn’t let herself dwell on any of those events for too long._

_She had to move forward. She had to trust her gut. Her gut had told her not to date a mercenary. She hadn’t exactly dated Scylla, but the hooking up in an abandoned hut? That had been a mistake. One that she wouldn’t allow herself to repeat. No matter how good it had felt._

_Nope, she thought, forcing her head into the water as if it would cleanse her thoughts. Not thinking about that._

_After a much longer shower than she normally would take, she stepped out of the shower, feeling much cleaner than she had been since she left for the Tarim op what felt like a lifetime ago._

_She wiped the mirror to take in the extent of her sunburn. It was pretty bad, but she had worse. She looked tired. More than just physically tired and she felt it._

_All she wanted was to sleep and forget all of this. She would wake up and go back to medical and do the work she was meant to do away from the manipulation of the Spree._

_Unfortunately for her, Abigail and Tally were back in the room when she entered, still in a towel._

_Tally leapt to her feet and hugged Raelle, startling her into almost dropping her towel. She barely got a hand on it before she returned the hug, one hand holding her towel secure above her breasts as she did so._

_“Glad you could join us, shitbird,” Abigail drawled from where she was lounging on her bed, reading a book. To anyone else, it would have looked like a dismissal, but Raelle saw the book was upside down and smirked a bit._

_“Good book, Bellweather? Doing a bit of gravity reading, are you?”_

_Abigail gave her a puzzled look before looking at the book and realizing her mistake and abandoning the effort. She tossed the book onto her nightstand and stood. Tally slowly released her strong grip and allowed Raelle to step into a hug from Abigail._

_Raelle felt the stress release from Abigail’s shoulders. She pulled back and looked at her two best friends, noting the dark circles below their eyes._

_These past days had not been easy on them. That much was clear. Raelle felt another pang of guilt._

_“Y’all okay if I get some clothes on before we have this talk?” Raelle asked, turning to her closet and pulling a soft shirt and sleep shorts from it._

_The two shrugged, Abigail returning to her bed and Tally drifting to her own as she pulled on the clothes and hung up her towel on its hook._

_She decided then she wouldn’t tell them. They had been frantically searching for her, probably worrying the worst, and she had been sleeping with a mercenary in an abandoned hut. Sure, the incredibly short-lived relationship had devolved from there, but her friends didn’t need to hear the details of an encounter Raelle was still getting her head around._

_Not now, at least._

_Another time, she had thought. And she had thought it again every time they had been alone since then._

_She even thought it now as they laughed with one another while getting ready for Beltane._

_She couldn’t dump this story on them before Beltane, an event Tally had been looking forward to for so long. She knew Abigail loved dressing up and any excuse to do such so she wasn’t all that interested in sabotaging her friends’ evenings._

_When she had asked Anacostia if she could be excused from Beltane and the staff sergeant had laughed and told her that if she had to go, so did the surgeon and walked away._

_Raelle wasn’t exactly feeling in a festive kind of mood. She thought that maybe as she got dressed up, some of Tally’s excitement might rub off on her, but to no such avail._

_She could admit that Tally was right. They did scrub up pretty well._

_Abigail had chosen a coral colored dress that she had paired with a bold lip, letting her hair down in waves. Tally had decided on a yellow dress after toiling between the one she had chosen and a black one. Abigail and Raelle had talked her into a yellow dress that may have tastefully accentuated her breasts while still meeting the expected dress code of not bearing too much skin._

_Raelle had waffled on making a decision to the point that Abigail and Tally had made it for her. She sort of leaned into the idea of her being kidnapped and traumatized as an excuse, when she knew she was spending the time beating herself up for making the stupid decision of letting herself trust Scylla no matter how short the period of time was._

_The dress they had selected was blue, a cobalt that brought out her eyes. She told herself and them that if it didn’t fit that would be a sign she shouldn’t go._

_It fit perfectly. Raelle had shot Tally a suspicious look as the redhead looked forcibly innocent in a way that told Raelle she had her mom pick this dress out specifically with the surgeon in mind. Abigail had smirked at her as her attempts to get out of Beltane were thwarted again._

_Their dresses were all floor-length which Raelle thought was bit foolish considering that dirt pathways that were the norm for the village. All three had opted for sandals, figuring heels would be more of a detriment than an accessory on such uneven ground. Their shoulders were covered, either by sleeves like Abigail’s dress or capped sleeves like Tally’s or flutter sleeves in Raelle’s case._

_Raelle was personally rather fond of her shoulders and her knees and found the patriarchal traditions of the village a bit oppressive which was another argument she had tried to get out of Beltane earlier in the week. She would have preferred a suit to a dress, but because of the, in Raelle’s mind, rather antiquated expectations of women, she was stuck in a dress going to a festival she didn’t want to attend._

_Maybe it was some kind of punishment for what had happened with Scylla. She supposed she deserved it if it were._

_“Collar, if you don’t get that frown off your face, I’ll come over and smack it off for you,” Abigail said dryly, giving herself the once over again in the mirror. Tally shot her a look._

_Tally had been a little more sympathetic to her whole kidnapping plight which she was both thankful for and felt even guiltier because._

_A knock erupted on the door, startling the three women, “Five minutes,” Anacostia’s voice rang out._

_“Let’s get this over with, shall we?” Raelle said, purposely frowning deeper to piss Abigail off more as she walked out the door._

_She wasn't interested in anything Beltane had to offer. Or so she thought._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Did I fake you out and make y’all think you were gonna get the whole Beltane story this week? You know I love drawing things out as long as possible haha. Thanks for reading! Again, would love to hear comments, predictions, favorite parts. 
> 
> Special shoutout to the folks who keep leaving comments on every chapter. For each of you that has taken the time to write so much as a one-word review to a full paragraph rant, thank you, truly. They make my day.


	13. Cool nights and cold shoulders

Chapter 13

It was dark. There was a stillness to the night that Tally Craven usually would have taken a moment to appreciate. Not tonight, though. She didn’t have time to bask in anything the desert offered tonight.

Her focus was as sharp as the crisp, night air.

The only sound was that of her companions breathing beside her. Their breaths were suspended in front of them, crystalizing with each exhale. Tally hardly felt the coolness of it all despite having hardly moved for the past hour.

It wasn’t near to Tally’s first stakeout. She had spent time in the past collecting intel and documenting the movements of a variety of parties. The undercurrent of urgency to the night was adding a certain air of anticipation to every moment of waiting.

They were set up on a ridge with what was rumored to be a Spree safehouse in their sights. Their bodies rest on the downslope of the ridge. Their elbows were propped on an outjutting that was serving as a perfect vantage point.

The Spree Byron had assigned to transport dropped the two teams off ten clicks from the rumored location. They had immediately split and hiked on different paths so as to not draw attention to themselves. The transporters drove off to wait out of the way.

Despite Abigail’s obstinate stance on the matter, Adil helped guide their team through the desert with a sureness and comfortability in his surroundings that had set the others at as much of an ease as they could have given the situation.

Scylla had tried to give the man a rifle which he turned down outright. She then offered a handgun which he also declined. Abigail hadn’t loved that piece of it either. Adil eventually relented and accepted a knife that Tally was certain was more for Abigail than him as she doubted the man would be using the knife on any human beings any time soon.

Adil was lying beside Abigail. Scylla had given him a pair of binoculars since he didn’t want a rifle with a scope. He had accepted a set of comms, but seemed rather baffled by the technology and hadn’t made much use of it.

She found a modicum of comfort in watching the two interact. Abigail was rarely ever flustered by men and Adil seemed to fluster her at every turn. He was nearly as stubborn as she was which seemed a near impossible feat. Neither would back down from an argument. Tally especially enjoyed the fact that most of their arguments seemed to center around the safety of one another.

Adil, the little that Tally had been able to gather about him in their limited interactions, seemed steady. Abigail Bellweather needed steady. He somehow became calmer while she became more worked up.

Balance. That was what Tally saw in the two. There was a balance of sorts.

Tally found a bit of amusement in the fact that Abigail had to focus her romantic energy on one of the more complex options in the desert. Adil was Tarim. Abigail was army. On paper, it didn’t make a bit of sense. Life always played out differently though, Tally knew that.

On paper, she and Gerit Buttonwood made perfect sense. In the harsh light of reality, not so much.

She heard Scylla shift slightly beside her and she spared a glance from the scope of her rifle to the Spree agent beside her.

There was a determined crinkle between Scylla’s eyebrows as she focused down her own rifle scope.

Abi had Adil and even if things had gotten mixed up along the way, Raelle had Scylla, whether she wanted her or not.

Tally knew there were parts of the story that Raelle had been leaving out. She wasn’t sure if Abigail hadn’t noticed or was purposely not digging in to get the whole truth. Even before this op, it had been painfully apparent to the redhead that Scylla Ramshorn was in deep with Raelle.

There was a time when Tally thought Raelle was in just as deep. Then, seemingly overnight, a coldness settled over her friend. She watched as she withdrew. She watched as her smile didn’t quite reach her eyes. She watched her and felt helpless that she couldn’t help.

Something had happened.

Tally wasn’t sure of the exact details. She wasn’t one to pry. That was more Abigail’s MO.

Instead, she did the small things like asking her mom to send a copy of a novel Raelle had mentioned she wanted to read. She saved her dessert from dinner and left it for the surgeon feigning fullness she definitely didn’t have. She kept Abigail busy when Raelle clearly needed time on her own. She did the little things and hoped they were enough.

It didn’t sate her curiosity on the subject.

She focused her gaze back down her scope, her mind still wandering to the brunette beside her.

Scylla was not nearly as much of a mystery as she tried to paint to others. Maybe it was because Tally was trained in seeing through people. Even before she was in the army, she had knack for reading people. No matter what the answer, the truth was unavoidable.

Tally couldn’t see why the Spree agent and her surgeon best friend kept trying to dodge it. But, she was intrigued. She would have to press pause on that intrigue, at least until they were through this op.

She stole a look at her watch. It was just approaching midnight. A new day. The clock continuing to tick on whether or not they got information they needed.

This could be big.

Or it could be a bust.

It was hard to tell at this point. It wasn’t as though the Camarilla ran around planting flags on their properties to announce their presence.

There were three men outside, assault rifles in their arms that could possibly be treated as the same message, but it wasn’t entirely as conclusive.

 _“Team two in place,”_ came through the comms.

They were back to being team one. Team two had set up shop some four clicks opposite where they were dug in. They had spotted a place that would offer a clearer line of sight and chosen to move to it some fifteen minutes prior.

“About fucking time,” she heard Abigail sigh out beside her.

 _“What have you got eyes on, team one?”_ Another voice came through the comms.

“Three men, armed, patrolling outside,” Scylla replied from her place next to Tally. “If our intel is correct, there are at least four in the building, likely to also be armed.”

“Two trucks parked behind the safehouse, drivers still in place,” Byron chimed in from his spot to the left of Scylla.

There was a flash of light on top of the roof and Tally swung her scope to focus on its origin. She paused, holding her breath to rid the scope of any shake. Another flash. Confirmation.

“Sniper on the roof,” she spoke clearly into her comms, feeling the team turn towards her in what might have been surprise.

There was a sniper there, she was certain. The sniper was planted, concealed cleverly beneath a tarp. Only the scope and rifle tip were visible. The scope had flashed the reflection of one of the outdoor lights. The flash was enough for Tally to identify it.

Abigail gave a long look down her scope before turning to Tally and patting her shoulder with a grin. “Nice, Tal,” she said.

“Good eye,” Scylla commended quietly off the comms, gazing down her own scope at the man who was clearly lying in wait for some sort of attack.

 _“Sniper and armed guards aren’t going to make this easy,”_ one of the Spree said over the comms from their place with team two. It was Bralin’s voice.

“We’ll need a distraction,” Scylla breathed out, shimmying back down the ridge until she was out of sight and moving to a crouch.

“Where do you think you’re going, Ramshorn?” Abigail asked over her shoulder, incredulously.

Scylla paid her no mind, placing the safety on her own rifle and slinging it over her shoulder. She gave Byron a nod and he tossed her a pack he had been carrying. She caught it with ease.

“Bellweather, you know what the difference between good plans and bad plans?” The brunette asked, buckling the pack onto her back and shuffling in the crouched position with a cocky smirk fixed on her lips. Abigail frowned at her expression, trying to figure out what she was getting at. Scylla, once again, didn’t seem to mind as she answered her own question with a sure raise of an eyebrow, “Preparation.”

“What in the actual fuck is that supposed to mean?” Abigail asked flat out. She then whisper shouted after Scylla who had begun to jog lightly off into the dark of the night. “Ramshorn! Where are you going?”

 _“Take the sniper down on my call,”_ Scylla spoke into the comms, the sound of her measured breathing puffing out from exertion.

“Stay where we are,” Byron said in an even tone towards what remained of their team. “Wait for the call.”

Tally heard Abigail settle back to position beside her.

It was only ten minutes later that they saw the beginnings of a flash of light over the ridge to the right. It started small, before rapidly building and growing in height.

Suddenly the sound of firecrackers began, fireworks popping off from some place in close vicinity to the fire’s source.

Tally’s brow furrowed for a moment. She then let out a laugh, scope sweeping to look back at the three men guarding the building. They had their attention.

“Come on, you bastards, take the bait,” Byron whispered under his breath. “You know you want to.”

The three armed men had gathered and were pointing at the fire in the distance, fireworks still popping off every minute or so.

The door to the safehouse flung open and a man stepped out. He shouted something at the men and two moved to the trucks behind the safehouse. It was a moment later that their lights flicked on and they peeled out in the direction of the flames in the distance. Tally shook her head a little, impressed, as she realized that the fire was placed a fair enough distance away from the safehouse.

 _“Team two, ready to move,”_ rang out over the comms, impatience clear from the tone. The fire had lit a fuse in their team. Tally heard her own heart beginning to beat in anticipation. They couldn’t move yet.

“Hold steady,” Byron replied back to them.

“Abi, what do you reckon the distance on that sniper is?” Tally asked, watching Abigail smirk as she caught Tally’s drift.

“What are you thinking, Tal?”

“1050 meters if I had to guess.”

“Sounds about right to me,” Abigail said. “You want to help me line this one up like the old days?”

“My pleasure,” Tally replied, scope sweeping around the rooftop. “Although, I might have a better target in mind.”

Her eyes locked on a set of barrels with a placard denoting flammability directly beside the sniper. She paused before pulling out a separate spotting scope and making some quick calculations on a notepad in front of her. She held a hand up, surveying the wind. It was thankfully a peaceful night from that standpoint. Cold, but static.

She ran the numbers again, locking in the distance in her spotter scope of 1070 meters. It was a long shot. Abigail could make it. Especially on a night with low wind.

Abigail was swapping out her ammo and placing a suppressor on the tip of the rifle, kicking out bipod legs for stability. She laid down after prepping the weapon. Tally breathed in sync with her.

She spoke out the afterwork of her calculations easily and Abigail adjusted her sights to line up the shot.

 _“Take down the sniper now,”_ Scylla’s voice breathed over the comms.

Abigail took a deep breath in, letting it out and squeezing the trigger once almost all the breath had left her lungs.

Even with the suppressor, the noise was loud, but the flash of the muzzle was blunted and the fireworks still going off in the distance provided a noisy backdrop.

Tally kept her eyes fixed on their target, tracking the bullet’s path to a place just above their target.

She spoke out the small adjustments Abigail would need to take. Abigail took another deep breath in and out, a squeeze of the trigger and another release from the gun.

This time, the bullet tracked directly into its target. Immediately, flames erupted from the oil barrels on the roof of the safehouse. Tally watched as the sniper shot to their feet, flames outlining their clothing as they frantically flapped their arms around before jumping from the roof.

“Time to move,” Byron cut out as Tally and Abigail were already packing up.

“Great shot, Abi,” Tally started quietly. It was a tradition from their training days.

“Great spot, Tal,” Abigail finished. The two shared a grin before joining their team in a sprint toward the safehouse.

There would only be one additional guard outside of the safehouse. The door to it had stayed, what Tally assumed, deliberately shut.

 _“Team two, do you have eyes on our third man outside the safehouse?”_ Byron’s voice came over the comms.

 _“Yes, target acquired, shot lined up. Awaiting further orders,”_ the words came back.

Byron had stopped running, a fist raised in the air as a signal for the rest of the team to stop beside him.

“Byron, what is it?” Tally asked, curiously.

He turned to her, a laugh coming from his lips before he shook his head and spoke into his comms, “Team two, hold, on that looks like the third man won’t be an issue much longer.”

Tally frowned, uncertain what he was talking about. Neither of them had a clear angle on a shot. She looked down her rifle’s scope only to catch sight of him being yanked to the ground and not returning.

 _“Team two approaching the safehouse from the flank,”_ the voice of a Spree agent floated across the comms. Byron, Abigail, Tally, and Adil were running to the front of the safehouse.

“Team one approaching from the front. Team two, we’ll need eyes toward that fire to track those trucks. I bet they’ll be speeding back after watching those barrels go up,” Byron commanded and a voice confirmed the order.

Tally was clearing the area surrounding the safehouse. The sniper was lying motionless on the ground in front of the building. Abigail quickly went to his side, feeling for a pulse that was no longer there.

Tally looked to the side of the building where the third guard had been. She saw Scylla fastening zipties around the man’s arms behind his back and his ankles. She shoved him to the side.

Byron reached out a hand and Scylla tossed him the bag back with a smirk. Her cheeks were painted a pink color possibly from exertion or from the cold of the evening and she was still catching her breath.

“What did you, toss your gun at him?” Byron asked her, reaching into the bag and placing several cannisters from it into his pockets.

Scylla bit out a laugh as he tossed her a gas mask. She caught the gas mask then held out a hand as he passed her two cannisters. She pulled the mask on after slipping the cannisters into place along her belt.

Byron held out two masks for Abigail and Tally and slipped one onto his own face. Adil had stayed on their heels as they approached and Byron gestured for him to stay close to this side of the building where he would be most safe.

“We need these men alive, detain and incapacitate as many as possible,” Scylla said, voice obscured slightly by the mask. Tally and Abigail shot a thumbs up her way. “Team two, covering positions.”

 _“Holding and watching,”_ came back across the comms.

Byron walked swiftly to the entrance, firing two rounds into the lock on the door then pausing and settling against the stone beside it. Gun shots rang out, cutting through the door’s frame before stopping. Scylla gave a tiny shake of her head when Byron went to move back in front of the door, holding up one finger.

A flurry of more gunfire swept out of the door, light and smoke filtering from the holes that remained.

A nod from Scylla and Byron stepped out, kicking the door down and tossing one cannister in. Scylla pulled the pin on both of her cannisters and threw them in opposite directions that Byron had.

“We are going to need transport in five minutes,” Byron said calmly over the comms to the drivers who would begin their drive to their location.

 _“We’ve got trucks coming back,”_ a member of team two breathed.

The sound of bodies hitting the floor echoed out from inside the safehouse.

 _One, two… three._ Tally counted.

One missing. There were meant to be four men in the safehouse. Only three bodies had hit the floor.

She looked up and noted the others must have been thinking the same thing.

Byron signaled for them to enter the safehouse and split to cover the grounds.

Tally nodded, feeling Abigail’s hand clasp briefly on her shoulder in confirmation. Byron counted to three using his fingers and then entered, Scylla on his tail. Tally and Abigail following close behind.

Byron and Scylla split to the left, leaving the right side to Tally and Abigail. They stepped carefully over the bodies of two men, sprawled out near a table, wine spilled onto the ground near them.

The safehouse was only a single room, bare besides the table in the middle and several couches around the edges. Tally couldn’t see any signs of the fourth man. Was it possible that he had fallen near the couches or was already seated and that’s why they hadn’t heard him drop?

Tally felt floorboards creak beneath her feet and startled slightly at the noise. It was concrete ground. There shouldn’t have been floorboards.

She wordlessly signaled Abigail and pointed down. Byron and Scylla were soon approaching and Tally pointed down again. Scylla nodded and Byron pulled a cannister from his pocket and gestured for all of them to step back. He then ripped up one of the floorboards and tossed the cannister in. They heard a startled yelp and the sound of gunfire before the fourth thud.

“All clear in the safehouse, securing the assets,” Byron said into the comms.

_“Friendly transport arriving.”_

“What about the not so friendly transport?” Scylla asked as she ziptied a man’s hands and tossed Tally some zipties for the man nearest her.

The sound of gunfire rang out over the next response. _“Rapidly returning.”_

“We’ve gotta move,” Scylla said and called for Adil and another Spree member to help them load the Camarilla members into the transport.

Tally grabbed one side of one of the men and Abigail the other, holding him up under his arms, his legs dragging behind them. They heard heavy gunfire and shouting.

Tally put her head down, thanking goddess when their transport pulled in at just that moment. They shoved the men into the back of one of the jeeps. Adil, Byron, Scylla, and the Spree member had successfully carried out the other three men.

“Assets secure, coming to help provide covering fire. Time to move,” Byron said, pushing Adil to get into the jeep.

Abigail had moved to the side of the building where team two had taken refuge behind a wall that was currently being pummeled with gunfire.

“We got one of the truck’s wheels and they spun out. Still one closing,” Bralin updated from his crouch as they approached.

“Covering fire,” Scylla commanded and Tally, Byron, and Abigail shot in the direction of the truck that was veering off its previously straight course perhaps at the notice of the number of those waiting for its return.

Team two scrambled towards the transport, Bralin at their rear.

Scylla gave a nod to each of them as she continued to fire, jerking her head in an order for them to hop into the transport.

Bralin shouted at her and she finally stood. Tally had always thought it was dumb when people said that any firefight was like slow motion. She had dismissed the notion.

Until tonight. Everything slowed. She saw Scylla running towards them and Bralin turning in place only to fall to the ground.

Tally ran back to his side, Scylla on the other and with effort they were able to get him back onto his feet. They moved arduously toward the jeep.

Bralin groaned as they loaded him into the back of one of the jeeps without the assets. He settled into a heap.

Tally and Scylla hopped in beside him, not bothering to close the trunk as Tally tapped her comms shouting, “Go, go, go,” into the mic.

She planted her feet into the divot above where the wheel was for support and lifted her rifle fully expecting the truck to be on them by now.

They sped off, Bralin’s blood quickly pooling beside her.

*****

_The air was full of joy and laughter._

_Scylla Ramshorn felt neither joy nor the urge to laugh. In fact, she would have much preferred to spend the evening in one of two ways. The first involved working and had been shot down quickly by Byron who had been near giddy and grating on Scylla’s last nerve for the past week. The second involved an early bedtime, perhaps a glass of wine, and a good book. Byron wasn’t having that either._

_It was Beltane and Byron wasn’t about to let Scylla out of fulfilling her end of the bet._

_Beltane._

_It was normally something Scylla looked forward to. There was dancing and drinking and fireworks. Who wouldn’t like that?_

_The entire village was out in full. As the evening turned to night, kids would be tucked into their beds and the adults were left to celebrate on their own. People didn’t go home until the sun was rising most of the time._

_There was another part to this. It was one that Scylla had been doing her best to push out of her mind, yet it still lingered. It might have been the wine or the food or the dancing. Something about Beltane made everyone, for lack of a better description, horny as hell._

_Scylla was aware of this, had even taken advantage of the fact in previous years. She wasn’t as committed as Byron was to find an annual Beltane partner to celebrate with. The man currently had the longest successful Beltane streak of any member of the Spree. She was sure he planned to keep it intact this year._

_Scylla had done well in the past. It was a fact that Byron often gave her shit for because whereas he would have to go out and find a partner, her partners usually came to her and if they didn’t (they usually did), she was always fine with that._

_This year, though, she wanted nothing to do with any of it._

_She didn’t acknowledge the lascivious glance from one of the men when they walked in. She avoided prolonged eye contact with the admittedly beautiful local woman across the room that kept trying to meet her eyeline._

_Scylla wasn’t interested in just any partner for Beltane._

_She had gone and shot herself in the foot a week and a half ago by sleeping with the woman she had been chasing for months and realizing it was even better than she had imagined._

_She didn’t think anything was going to compare and, well, frankly she didn’t really want to find out._

_It seemed like it would almost retroactively taint the experience in some way. As if, somehow, the experience hadn’t already been thoroughly tainted by the subsequent argument and ice out she’d since received from Raelle._

_She hadn’t been all that surprised by the actions. It didn’t stop it from hurting, all the same._

_Scylla had done her best to stay busy. And that, was quite easy. The same day they had returned, the Spree sent a team to raid the Camarilla safehouse she and Raelle had been taken to. In the boxes in the basement, beneath the rotting meat were explosives and ammunition._

_Scylla had snagged her trusty watch back from where she had tucked it into the wall, thanking the creator of GPS tracker chips wherever they were._

_There hadn’t been any people remaining in the safehouse, not that they had expected any. Ammunition and explosives meant someone was due to pick up at some point. By the smell of the rotting meat, it had to be soon._

_Scylla immediately assigned herself as lead on a stakeout. They inserted GPS trackers into the bottom of several of the crates, but getting photo confirmation of the players involved was ideal. They hadn’t been able to identify any of the lower level leadership yet._

_There was no movement in or out of the safehouse for the first day and a half. Scylla was starting to become impatient by the time Byron plopped into the trench beside her._

_He tossed her a bag lunch and a look that told her she should at least try to eat some of it as the Spree agent he relieved stepped out without a word._

_Byron let it rest some ten minutes, which Scylla actually commended him for, before he turned to Scylla and gave her a hard look._

_She did her best not to break immediately. It was odd for either of them to volunteer for a stakeout when there were newer members of the Spree that could easily gather the information they needed._

_Scylla didn’t think gathering intel was beneath her and told Byron as much._

_He snorted, propping himself against the side of the trench and crossing his arms to continue looking at her. She adjusted her neck gaiter (Raelle’s gaiter) and froze when she heard his gasp._

_Shit, she thought, and frantically pulled the gaiter back to cover her neck._

_Byron yanked it back down. His eyes were wide as he looked from her neck to her eyes, a wolfish grin spreading on his face._

_“Care to share?” Scylla glared at him before swatting his hand away._

_She knew there was a colorful cluster of healing bruises on her neck that couldn’t be mistaken for anything other than what they were._

_She sighed, knowing she would have to tell him the story sooner or later. She was hoping her taking the stakeout would have made it easier for that to become later._

_He surprisingly let her get the whole of it out before giving wiggling his eyebrows, proudly, “Can we go back to the lesbian hut bit? Big fan of that.”_

_She gave him a less than amused look. That was his focus? Of course, that was his focus. “Women loving women hut, I’ll accept. Otherwise, that’s just bi-erasure.”_

_He conceded as much before continuing. “So, you’re telling me that you slept together, but still somehow lost the bet?”_

_She glared at him and he laughed, clearly enjoying teasing her in a situation where she couldn’t walk away._

_He wasn’t wrong. Had their situations been reversed, she was certain she would never let Byron hear the end of it._

_She hadn’t even gotten a chance to ask Raelle to Beltane. Now, she wasn’t sure the surgeon would even talk to her. The idea of Raelle agreeing to be her date to a village festival seemed preposterous._

_Scylla put her time and energy into the Camarilla and maybe some of it into avoiding Byron instead. The op was successful as they had been able to photographs some of the lower level members who came to pick up the drop as well as a potential location of some Camarilla operations. The avoiding Byron? Not so much._

_He had been smirking a little too much in the past week for Scylla’s liking. He had always been a smug winner; it proved no different this time around. Scylla’s tolerance for it was a slightly lower than usual._

_Her tolerance for everything seemed to be slightly lower than usual, she thought as she gave a questioning look down at the wine glass in her hand._

_She had only had two, actually maybe three glasses of wine. She wiggled the fingers on free hand in front of her, noting a slight delay in her sensation._

_She needed to slow down. They were still at the village government sponsored Beltane party. The real fun began later and Scylla was already feeling the effects of the, apparently, potent wine._

_The village government hosted a fancy Beltane party every year. It was a chance for the local government officials to put on a show for their guests and show off the central government building’s stunning architecture. The building they were in had high arching ceilings with hand placed tiles making up an incredible mosaic that sprawled the length of the ceiling. It was a myriad of colors and culture. The building was some hundred years old, having stood the test of time better than any modern construction seemed to._

_Whatever thoughts she had floated entirely out of her mind as she noted the small group that had just arrived._

_The army was here, although they didn’t look anything like the army tonight. The men were wearing a variety of suits, some more formal in appearance than others. The women? Scylla felt the temperature in the room rise as she tracked the women in gowns strutting in through the entrance._

_She took a long pull at her wine, feeling Byron saddle up next to her. Her eyes were drawn of their own volition to a surgeon near the back who looked about as happy as Scylla was to be there._

_“You know, you could just go and talk to her,” Byron said in Arabic, giving Scylla a pointed look._

_“I’m much too bisexual for that,” Scylla sighed out, taking another heavy swig of her wine and glancing again in the direction of the surgeon who was wearing a stunning floor-length gown that was a brilliant shade of blue. Her hair was down and straight and Scylla was decidedly not._

_Byron shook his head, “Nope, you’re not allowed to wallow in self-pity at Beltane. Either you go talk to her or I go do it for you.”_

_Scylla’s eyes widened almost comically, “Byron, I can’t just walk over to her and be like hey, remember when you gave me the silent treatment after you figured out we let Camarilla into the Tarim camp as part of a side op?”_

_“Why not? That sounds like a great ice breaker,” he was slowly ushering them through the crowd and closer to the blonde._

_Scylla narrowed her eyes at him. “That is not— What?”_

_Then suddenly they were standing in front of the surgeon. Her redheaded friend, Craven, if Scylla remembered correctly, was currently engaged in conversation with an attractive local man. Scylla counted her blessings that Bellweather didn’t appear to be near them at the moment. The brunette had a rather strongly negative opinion of the Spree agent and this was already going to be a disaster._

_Raelle looked up in almost surprise at their arrival before landing on a scowl when she saw Scylla being dragged beside Byron._

_“Ladies,” Byron greeted with a little bow. Scylla wanted to slap him. “You look fantastic this evening.”_

_“Byron,” Raelle greeted warmly, then quickly dropping any warmth from her tone. “Ramshorn.”_

_Scylla still wasn’t exactly certain how she had ended up the scapegoat of all the Spree actions and Byron had escaped them. It might have had something to do with Byron staying the Tarim camp until the mission was completed._

_Scylla had been told by Byron that the blonde hadn’t shown much hostility toward him when she greeted the medical team back to Fort Salem._

_“I take it you’re all aware of the Beltane that happens after the stuffy government Beltane?” Byron started easily. Scylla ground her heel into his toe. He smiled through a grimace, adjusting his stance only slightly before continuing. “When this is winding down, come find us and we can escort you and any friends you think might be interested there.”_

_Byron gave a tiny bow of his head (asshat, Scylla thought rolling her eyes so hard she nearly lost balance) and then stepped back. Scylla was caught in front of Raelle with a now empty glass of wine feeling the effects of every drop she had consumed before this moment._

_“Real Beltane?” Craven asked, curiously, her attention now on Scylla. Scylla peered over her shoulder for Byron, knowing full well he wouldn’t be there any longer, before forcing a smile and nodding._

_“On the village’s edge. Even the Tarim join in. It’s, um,” she fumbled with her words, looking down, “If you want to come, you should. Think about, that is.” She felt the heat of the blonde’s gaze on her, staring entirely through her and was ready to flee. “Better go –” She gestured vaguely in the direction Byron had disappeared and stepped away from the women._

_Byron Rostam was going to pay for that somehow. Someday when he least expected it, she was going to prank the ever-living shit out of him._

_That was, by far, one of the most awkward conversations (could you even call it a conversation if she was the only one truly talking?) Scylla had been a part of in years. She wasn’t used to not having the upper hand._

_She knew one thing for certain, Raelle wasn’t going to be seeking her and Byron out at the end of this function. It was probably for the best. Did Scylla really need to keep making a fool of herself in front of the surgeon? Wasn’t that enough for the evening?_

_She walked steadily over to the bar area and paid a man for another glass of wine. She thanked him and stepped in the opposite direction of where Raelle and her friends were congregated._

_Fuck, she thought, setting the glass down onto one of the many small tables that had been set up for the event before even taking another sip._

_The last thing she needed was to be drunk. She was well past buzzed, tiptoeing from tipsy to drunk. She should stop now. She should really just go home and go to bed. Let Byron and Raelle and her friends have their fun. She didn’t need to bring all of them down. She could toss Byron the rest of the currency she had left and tell him to go crazy with it for all she cared._

_“Ah, Scylla,” a man she recognized as being on the village’s council approached her._

_She painted a smile onto her face. This was part of her job, wasn’t it? The village relations piece to being Spree._

_She spoke with the man for some time before they were joined by another man and his wife. Scylla didn’t want to be rude and step away from the conversation that seemed to prattle on and on._

_She laughed at all the right parts, guffawed at the parts of the storytelling the others did._

_She was good at this._

_Pretending._

_She always had been._

_It was some hours later that Byron reappeared with a glassy appearance to his eyes and a lazy smile stretched across his lips that told Scylla everything she needed to know about where he had gotten off to. He politely asked if he could borrow Scylla from the group and she shot him a grateful look at the interruption._

_“Getting to be time to go,” he spoke, an airy quality to his voice that sounded like freedom._

_Scylla sometimes wished he didn’t have to smoke or drink to sound this at peace. She knew it wasn’t as easy as that. Nothing ever was._

_He paused, squinting an eye and then licking his thumb to smudge at something on her cheek._

_“Hey,” she pushed him away, “What the hell?”_

_“Your lipstick smeared from all your fake smiling. You’re welcome.”_

_She settled, apologizing quietly. He waved her off. “You’re about to thank me, for real this time.”_

_Her brow furrowed. He was being weird. She shook off the thought as they weaved out the entrance to the village streets that were similarly lively to the events taking place inside._

_“Ladies,” Byron greeted and Scylla felt her stomach sink to her feet. Standing just outside the entrance were Raelle, Bellweather, and Craven. Raelle was wearing an unreadable expression, Craven a bright smile, and Bellweather a skeptical one._

_Well, it’s not like this night could get any worse. Or could it?_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, everyone. Sorry for the delay and the additional cut of Beltane (which, once again, y’all had to expect at this point?). I was sick for a bit and then got called into work unexpectedly that cut into my writing time.
> 
> I’m loving all the comments and predictions! Some of you nailed the watch bit. Beltane will have at least one more part to it. I’m thinking I might be able to fit everything left into a single flashback next chapter with Raelle at the helm. 
> 
> Obviously, the Camarilla op is heating up a little bit. Who doesn’t love seeing Tally, Abigail, and Scylla in their element? Thank you all for reading. If you have time, please drop a comment. I’d love to hear from you!
> 
> Update 11/1/20: Likely going to be a bit of delay in the next chapter. Been busy helping with election get out the vote activities the last few weeks instead of writing. If you're in the US, be sure to vote on 11/3!


	14. Golden hues of times better spent

Chapter 14

“He needs pressure. You’ve got to hold pressure,” Scylla instructed in a voice that was low and urgent.

“No shit, Sherlock,” Abigail bit out as she pushed Scylla’s hands away and leaned the whole of her body weight onto Bralin’s shoulder. The man let out a heavy grown, shifting, and Tally and Scylla scrambled to restrain him from shoving Abigail off.

Abigail readjusted to straddle the shoulder in an effort to both stabilize her position in the speeding jeep and more evenly distribute her weight.

Scylla, having realized Bralin wasn’t going to buck Abigail off anytime soon, sat back to reach for a nearby med pack they had left in the jeep during the mission.

The sound of bullets peppering the bumper had, thankfully, dampened entirely off.

They were getting away. They had almost gotten away without any casualties until Bralin had collapsed a mere couple of feet from the safe haven of the jeep.

Scylla unzipped the front compartment of the pack, carelessly tossing some of the contents aside until she found what she was looking for. She passed a sealed abdominal pad to Tally who caught it.

“Abi,” Tally said, tearing it open and holding it out to the brunette.

Bralin was groaning incomprehensibly, his entire body tense like stone beneath her. Abigail held one hand out and took the gauze. Her hands were already coated in blood.

Bralin’s blood.

She took a deep breath before quickly sliding the gauze in between Bralin’s wound and her hand.

Scylla had dug a zippered medication pouch from the pack. She took the cap off a single autoinjector with her teeth, spitting it to the side before slamming it into Bralin’s thigh. “Hold on, Bralin.” She popped the cap on another autoinjector and slammed it into his other thigh. Bralin was a big guy, Abigail didn’t know what dose those syringes were, but double of whatever it was probably made sense. “Morphine is in.”

He softened slightly as the medication took effect.

Scylla slipped a headlamp on and passed one to Tally before securing one on Abigail’s head. She turned her own on to what had to be its lowest setting.

“Bellweather, is the bullet still in?”

Abigail shot Scylla a look, maybe purposely blinding her with her headlamp for full effect. “You want me to hold pressure or you want me to do surgery, Ramshorn?”

Scylla rolled her eyes, blinking rapidly, and squinting back at her, “Well, we can’t all have the army’s resources, can we?”

Abigail scoffed, attention shifting back to Bralin. “Are you telling me you aren’t going to have a surgeon waiting to take care of,” she gave a firm nod towards her hands, “this mess? Don’t get me wrong, I have field medic training, just like Tally, but this is beyond our depths.”

“If you’re too squeamish to do the job, move over,” Scylla replied, dry and impatient.

“By all means,” Abigail replied, moving off the shoulder and allowing Scylla to replace her. She moved down the body where Tally was focused on placing an IV in Bralin’s left antecubital fossa.

The truck was still racing with speed, the radio crackling with updates from the other Spree vehicle. Abigail tuned it out. Her job wasn’t driving. Her job was here in the trunk of this jeep.

Bralin gave a loud groan as Scylla pushed his shoulder up. She let out a sigh as she set him back down.

“No exit wound,” she said, mostly to herself. “Bellweather, I need the saline and sterile gloves from that bag.”

Abigail grabbed the open pack, reaching in and searching for what was requested. It was an army requirement that you know each and every piece of your equipment for moments just like this so you wouldn’t have to think, you could just move.

But this wasn’t Abigail’s pack, this wasn't an Army pack. She hadn’t studied its contents before they moved out. This was an auxiliary bag that had been set in the back and untouched until they returned. The writing on some of the materials was in Arabic which certainly didn’t help.

“Fuck it,” she said, opening all the pack’s zippers and dumping the contents on the ground in front of her.

The jeep jolted as they passed over a pothole in the ground and all three of the women braced themselves so they wouldn’t go crashing into the ceiling.

“Sorry,” the driver called out, but none of the women acknowledged the apology.

“Aha,” Abigail exclaimed, parting the supplies to find a pair of sterile gloves that looked to be Scylla’s size and a bottle of saline.

“IV’s in,” Tally spoke to the group, reaching for a bag of saline and tubing that had tumbled out of the pack Abigail upturned.

“Bellweather,” Scylla drawled and Abigail threw the sterile glove pack over to her. She then used a knife to pop a couple of holes in the bottle of saline while Scylla put the gloves on.

Abigail crouched over Bralin’s wound, squeezing the bottle that had been made into a kind of makeshift pressure wash. She rinsed the wound as thoroughly as she could, using the gauze to shield the backspray.

“Hand me the scalpel,” Scylla spoke evenly, holding one gloved hand out between them.

Abigail narrowed her eyes at the Spree agent, setting the bottle of saline down beside her.

“I need the scalpel to explore the wound,” Scylla explained at Abigail’s look of apprehension. “He could be bleeding out inside that wound without us knowing. Personally, I’d like to at least pretend we’ve got some control of the situation.”

Abigail shook her head, trying not to roll her eyes before handing over the tool.

“Alright, Bralin,” Scylla said, “This isn’t going to be fun. Hold with me, here.”

She cut laterally into the bullet wound with the scalpel, widening its diameter enough to fit her fingers in.

Abigail knew what she would feel. Had felt it before herself. It would be warm. That was always the surreal part of it. She had never known how Raelle could do it. How she could walk in and put everything back together when it was falling apart, how she could put people back together.

Bralin jerked up, groaning again at the intrusion. Abigail sprung forward to help Tally steady him back down.

“Okay, okay, sorry, Bralin,” Scylla said, still digging. “Almost there.”

She leaned further in, digits up to the knuckle. She twisted the hand, Bralin groaning even louder.

“It’s fucking arterial,” she sighed. “Got it! Can you get me a clamp?”

Abigail dug through the materials searching for the sealed tool. She tossed package after package to the side. There, that was it.

She handed the tool to Scylla who used her free hand to open it and placed it carefully beside her fingers. She squeezed the clamp shut, the sound of metal snapping into place.

“Okay, okay,” Scylla said, withdrawing her hand slowly, the clamp still sticking straight out of the wound. “I think I got it.”

She held a shiny bullet up to the light with a tired smile before she pulled more gauze to pack the wound.

Abigail took in the scene around them. It looked like some sort of crime scene. There was blood and blood-stained equipment scattered around the trunk of the jeep. Shards of glass were everywhere in the trunk. The back window had shattered from gunfire in their escape.

Tally, Scylla, and Abigail all had sweat dripping down their faces from exertion in defiance of the cold temperatures outside.

The windows were fogged with condensation from their heavy breaths.

Scylla had a streak of Bralin’s blood swept across her forehead. Her brow was furrowed deeply in concentration as she continued to tend to the wound.

Tally fixed the bag of saline to the hand grip near the backseat door, its steady dripping flowing through the IV into Bralin’s arm.

Bralin looked pale. Abigail reached out and noted that his hands were cool to touch.

“Do we have a blanket?” She asked.

“Under the front seat,” the driver spoke over his shoulder.

Abigail reached carefully over the seat, folding it down as she grabbed the blanket from there and spread it out over Bralin.

He was in shock. Not all that surprising given the circumstances.

Abigail let out a heavy breath, sitting back onto her heels. She wiped at the sweat on her brow with the back of her hand.

This wasn’t good.

She sighed again.

“Got something to say, Bellweather?” Scylla asked, a biting tone to her question.

Abigail’s head shot up. She was ready for a fight. She was always ready for a fight.

“Yeah, Ramshorn. He needs a doctor. You know it as well I do.”

Scylla tensed before breathing noisily through her nose, shoulders sagging in seeming defeat.

“You’re right. We don’t have any surgeons on facility right now. At least none that would be able to help him keep his arm.”

Abigail thought about that for a moment. She had a solution.

It wasn’t one she particularly cared for. She met Tally’s eyeline and saw she was thinking it too.

The two shared a brief nod before Abigail spoke.

“We bring him to Fort Salem.”

“Is that the wisest idea?” Byron said from the front seat.

Abigail shrugged.

This was likely their only option.

“I don’t think they would turn us away. Especially after how you helped us at the bombing.”

“Do you have the resources?”

It was a fair question. The Camarilla had blown their med building up.

“Yes,” Tally assured them, “We set up a tent to serve as the medical building until they’re able to rebuild.”

The army had shipped crates and crates of supplies to replace what they had lost. Fort Salem would not be without medical for long, even despite the losses.

“It’s risky,” Scylla said after a moment. “But I think you’re right.”

Abigail reared back slightly in surprise before sending her a small nod of agreement and appreciation. She hadn’t been expecting Scylla to be so reasonable. In fact, she expected some push back just for push back’s sake.

She may have made some minor miscalculations in her interpretation of Scylla Ramshorn’s character.

“We’ll have to drop the two of you off before we go,” Byron added.

Tally and Abigail sunk back to a sitting position in realization.

They couldn’t be seen running with the Spree when they were supposed to be in Germany.

Abigail shook her head. “He needs to be on an operating table if he’s got any hope of keeping that arm.”

“We don’t have time for that,” Tally agreed.

“We’ll figure it out,” Scylla reassured them.

This wasn’t going to be easy, but it was right.

*****

_Raelle Collar was drunk._

_She hadn’t meant to, no, hadn’t set out for the night with the intention of drinking everything in sight._

_Yet, here she was._

_And, there Scylla Ramshorn was, just a few steps ahead of her, cautiously checking back to make sure Raelle, Abigail, and Tally were still following her and Byron._

_The two Spree agents were having some sort of silent argument up ahead. They were exchanging a series of shrugs and speaking entirely with their facial expressions. For being silent, the argument was quite loud._

_Raelle was stewing wordlessly behind them. She was doing everything in her power to make certain her companions were aware that this wasn’t her idea. She had the distant thought that maybe the stewing would be more effective if she wasn’t forced to watch every step she took to be sure she didn’t lose her balance._

_When it came down to it, it was really her own fault._

_She should have realized Tally would pull some sort of matchmaking attempt and that Abigail would be interested in any afterparty that showed a lick of promise. If she had told them about what happened between her and Scylla… maybe then Tally would have let it go._

_Or maybe it would’ve made Tally meddle more. Raelle couldn’t be sure. Raelle did know it wouldn’t have done much to sway Abigail either way. That was all beside the point._

_Because they were going. They were following Byron and Scylla to some Beltane event that was supposedly less uptight and governmental._

_“Hey, shitbird,” Abigail said beside her and she turned to look at the girl. Abigail was built for fine dresses. It was practically in the Bellweather DNA. Her perfectly styled hair seemed to have only improved over the course of the night. Raelle hated that. She was sure she looked as rough as she felt, but couldn’t bring herself to care. “You wanna pretend to be happy about them doing us a favor or do you think it’d actually kill you?”_

_Raelle rolled her eyes and instantly regretted the action as the world took a little bit longer than she had anticipated to right itself._

_“Well?” Abigail said again._

_Raelle narrowed her eyes instead. Same effect really, she figured. “It seems like we’re going to find out, huh, Bellweather?”_

_Tally tsked beside her, the scolding only lingering a minute before she skipped forward to ask Byron a question interrupting whatever exchange he and Scylla were having. She looped her arm through his and he smiled down at her._

_Scylla slowed her pace slightly until she was even with Abigail and Raelle._

_Abigail took one look between the two before smirking at Raelle and walking with purpose to Byron’s other side and lacing her arm through his open one._

_Bitch, Raelle thought, hoping it would reach her with the strength of it._

_The brunette spun back, raising and eyebrow, and maybe it had._

_Silence rang between the two. There was noise and conversation all around them. The air was rich with excitement. All Raelle felt was tension._

_“So,” the Spree agent whistled out._

_Raelle kept her gaze forward. She didn’t need to turn to look at Scylla to know the brunette was in a tasteful red dress that hugged each and every curve she had spent time in that hut getting to know. She didn’t need to look to know that she was wearing a lipstick that matched her dress and that her eyes were outlined by flawless eyeliner with a stunning eyeshadow that complimented her skin tone._

_“You look nice tonight,” Scylla tried._

_Raelle’s head snapped toward her in disbelief._

_“What?” Scylla’s eyes widened. “You want me to think you don’t look nice?”_

_The surgeon scoffed. “I want you to not come and talk to me like you didn’t purposely put people in danger.”_

_The brunette nodded at that, accepting it, “I can see where that would make you upset—”_

_“Upset?” Raelle said, words muted so the three in front of them wouldn’t hear. “Yeah, I guess you can say I’m a little upset.”_

_“Okay, you’re angry—"_

_Raelle cut in, “Are you just going to tell me what I’m feeling or is there going to be any part of this that’s actually worth my time?”_

_Scylla blanched at that, sucking a low breath in._

_They had come upon a large gathering of people celebrating. There were a number of fires strategically placed for warmth and torches that provided a surprising amount of light. There were pools of different people. It looked like the entire village was here._

_A number of people gave a shout and cheered as Byron approached and began to greet them with Tally and Abigail at his side._

_Raelle wasn’t surprised. Byron seemed to know everyone and everyone seemed to like Byron. It was hard not to._

_Raelle caught sight of a number of people milling about in familiar attire._

_They were Tarim. The Tarim were here for the festival. The Tarim that Scylla had used as some sort of chess board in whatever game she was playing without thinking about the chaos and destruction it could leave behind._

_“Dr. Collar!” A voice called out and Raelle could have kissed Adil if she weren’t so gay and he weren’t so male._

_“Adil,” she sighed, accepting the handshake he offered. “How are you?”_

_“How am I?” He asked, smiling, “I should be asking you that. You’re the one who was kidnapped! I was so glad to hear you and Scylla were okay.”_

_“Yeah,” the surgeon said, turning to look for the brunette, but she was already gone into the crowd._

_Good, Raelle thought. Maybe she had gotten the message._

_“How’s Khalida?” She asked and the man launched into a detailed summary of each day since she had last seen the little girl._

_It was a good distraction. Even in her intoxicated state, patient care and the thought of it calmed her._

_She felt herself relaxing. Byron had brought her a mug of something very strong and she had floated through the crowd with Adil acting as an interpreter as many of the Tarim thanked her for her work in the desert and shared their relief that she was okay._

_Byron had goaded her into some dancing with the help of Tally and Abigail who had both attracted a small pool of suitors that appeared to be watching their movements from a respectful distance away. It reminded Raelle of many nights out back in the states._

_It was light. All of this, it felt light in a way Raelle hadn’t in the past week at all. The happiness of it all was contagious._

_The alcohol acted as the social lubricant it so often was and Raelle found herself laughing as Abigail teased Tally about the striking villager who was holding two glasses of drink just waiting for her to finish her current glass. She found herself laughing as Abigail took her by the hand and led her through the steps of a tango from her dance lessons as a kid. Raelle stomped all over her feet, but Abigail didn’t seem to mind._

_It was nice to forget. It was nice to pretend that they were just on vacation here and not in situations where their lives were on the line day in and day out. It was nice to pretend they weren’t part of something bigger._

_It was some time later that Tally was dancing rather intimately with one of her male suitors and Raelle had lost track of both Adil and Byron. Abigail had disappeared as she often did when they went out together. She would normally reappear at some point close to when the others were ready to leave with a smirk of satisfaction fixed on her lips._

_Abigail Bellweather had never been one for attachment, but she was someone who got what she needed when she needed it._

_Raelle was politely stepping away from her dance partners to catch her breath._

_She had almost forgotten. It would, of course, be a whole lot easier to forget if she wouldn’t keep popping up._

_“What do you want, Ramshorn?” Raelle bit out as the brunette sheepishly approached where she was standing next to one of the fires._

_“I know firsthand exactly how potent that stuff is, thought you might want something to hydrate with,” Scylla was holding out a water, another opened one in her other hand._

_Raelle looked down at it. She was thirsty. She hadn’t had anything but alcohol to drink all night. Usually, she was more careful about those things. She knew she would probably have a raging hangover tomorrow as a reminder of just how much fun she had been having._

_She reached out and took the water bottle. “Thanks.”_

_“Of course,” Scylla brightened, a smile appearing on her lips._

_“Don’t think this means I’m not still mad at you.”_

_“Of course not,” she repeated, smile turning down at the corners._

_Raelle opened the water and carefully drank about a third of its contents._

_“What do you think of your first Beltane?” Scylla asked, fidgeting with the water bottle in her hands._

_“It’s,” she started, eyes falling on a couple with their hands a little too far down each other’s pants to be recognized for anything other than what it was. Beside them was another couple with their tongues meeting as they sloppily kissed. “Unique.”_

_Scylla laughed a little, her eyes tracing to where Raelle was looking. “That’s one way of putting it.”_

_“I didn’t expect the Tarim to be here,” Raelle admitted after a moment. “I thought they couldn’t come into the village unless for trading purposes.”_

_The Spree agent shrugged, “Everybody makes exceptions for Beltane.”_

_The blonde hummed in reply. She didn’t want to admit it, but seeing the Tarim here and happy and thanking her had made the angst of the preparing for the night worth it._

_The evening had a sort of golden glow to it that Raelle appreciated._

_And Scylla? She had a sort of golden glow to her too. Her features outlined by the nearby fire reminded Raelle of that night in the desert. It reminded her of the flickering light in the hut before it had all gone wrong._

_It was easier then._

_She had been so sure that she was making the right decision. Black and white had dissolved into a solid gray that she was comfortable basking in._

_She wasn’t so sure of anything now._

_“Any chance you know where a bathroom is?” Raelle asked after some time. She had been doing her best to ignore nature’s calling for a while and knew the Spree agent had to have some intel on where to find a bathroom._

_Scylla looked up, startled slightly at the question before nodding. Raelle set down her mug of liquor and followed the brunette through the crowd._

_It was a short walk before they approached a front door. Scylla opened it without so much a glance around._

_“Are we breaking in?” Raelle asked._

_Scylla smiled a humorless smile, perhaps at the thought that Raelle thought so little of her. “No, no. Byron and I helped build this house a couple years back after a drone strike mistakenly blew it sky high. They have a bathroom, just through here,” Scylla pointed at a door and Raelle flicked the light on inside._

_It was a small bathroom, a bathtub and its curtain taking up most of it. There was a toilet that Raelle made use of before washing her hands in front of the mirror._

_She stared at her face in the mirror._

_Her makeup had run slightly from the dancing She carefully corrected it with her thumb._

_She looked tired. She knew it was the kind of tired that would need more than a good night’s rest to be fixed._

_She had hardly slept that week. Every time she put her head down on her pillow, her mind would swarm with all of the unanswered questions the previous week had left her with._

_The army hadn’t found out. They didn’t know that it was the Spree who had purposely allowed a security breach as part of a secondary op. They didn’t know because Raelle hadn’t told them._

_Why hadn’t she told them?_

_That was one of the questions she had been struggling with the most._

_What reason did she have to hold onto that information? Was she doing it to protect Scylla? If so, why? It wasn’t like the brunette had been interested in anything other than completing her own objectives._

_She frowned at her reflection._

_Why had Scylla slept with her?_

_Was it some sort of conquest with Scylla as the conqueror and now it was done? Had she gone back to the Spree and told them all the story of how she had seduced the surgeon in the hut over dinner, describing the tryst in excruciating detail in the same way that Raelle had eavesdropped on her male colleagues swapping lewd stories after returning from leave?_

_Her eyes flashed with anger at the thought._

_Was she a joke to the Spree now? Just another one of Scylla’s lays?_

_She opened the door with a little more force than she intended and Scylla jumped to attention on the other side. She didn’t have time to say anything as Raelle rounded on her._

_“Why did you sleep with me?”_

_“What?”_

_“You heard me,” she closed the gap between them, an accusing finger prodding Scylla below the collarbone. “Was it some sort of a bet?”_

_Scylla looked affronted, “No, it wasn’t a bet. I thought I was pretty clear why I slept with you.”_

_“And why was that? You wanted to keep me from putting the pieces of it all together?”_

_Scylla stepped back, shaking her head. “No, that’s –”_

_“You probably told everyone in the Spree facility about it, didn’t you?”_

_“What? No, I wouldn’t –”_

_Raelle raised a single eyebrow, “Try and tell me Byron doesn’t know.”_

_Scylla shook her head, “That’s different. Byron is –”_

_“It didn’t mean anything to me either,” the blonde declared suddenly trying to beat the brunette to the punch. Scylla startled silent, mouth opening and closing soundlessly. She looked hurt._

_Good, Raelle thought, let her feel a modicum of the pain she had been feeling the last week._

_“It didn’t mean anything,” she repeated again, firmer this time. She watched the brunette recoil slightly. “I didn’t feel anything.”_

_“Right,” Scylla said, nodding slowly as she processed. “You came twice, but you didn’t feel anything.”_

_Raelle felt her cheeks burn. “That is beside the point.”_

_“Is it?” Scylla started to challenge her. It was like she was finally waking up._

_“Yes,” Raelle said, voice raising in anger now, “It is. You know exactly what I mean.”_

_“Do I?” Scylla asked, hurt expression giving way to one of anger. “Do I know what you mean? Because it seems to me like you don’t even know what you mean.”_

_“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”_

_“Goddess, this conversation is going absolutely nowhere!” The brunette threw her hands up and started to walk away._

_“That,” the blonde stated vehemently, “That is what I was saying. This,” she gestured between the two of them, “Is going absolutely nowhere.”_

_“Then why do you keep talking to me? Huh?” The Spree agent rounded on her, frustration rich in her tone. “Why follow me and Byron to a Beltane party when you could be back in your bed away from me if I’m so damn unsufferable?”_

_Raelle scoffed. “See, that’s what you don’t seem to get. I don’t want to be here. I didn’t ask to be here.”_

_“And I did?”_

_“Well, yes, you did. You asked us to come and of course Tally and Abigail were going to make me come.”_

_“Byron asked you to come, I didn’t.”_

_Raelle gave her a look. “Can’t you just admit that you were wrong?”_

_“About what?”_

_“About the Camarilla and the Tarim,” Raelle all but shouted back at her._

_“And what if I don’t think that I’m wrong? Do you want me to lie?”_

_“Well, it’s not like you’re not good at it.”_

_Scylla ran a hand through her hair. “I was doing my job, Raelle,” she said in exasperation, “What do you want me to say?”_

_“I want you to take even the tiniest bit of responsibility for what could have gone wrong.”_

_“Well, it didn’t, did it? It didn't go wrong. Maybe if you weren’t so busy being all high and mighty for one second, you’d be able to see that.”_

_“High and mighty?? Oh, sure that’s just-- You’re just -- You’re impossible, you know that?”_

_“I’m impossible? You refuse to let yourself feel anything because of what? Some misguided sense of duty and obligation. Tell me, Raelle, what’s your real issue with me? Is it that I’m Spree?”_

_“You’re a mercenary.”_

_“I am not a mercenary—“_

_“I don’t date mercenaries.”_

_“So that’s it, huh? I’m a mercenary so it doesn’t matter what you feel, it can never happen?”_

_“Yeah.”_

_“Yeah?” She challenged, taking a step closer to Raelle, now mere inches away._

_“You want to tell yourself that, or should I? You’ve been giving me mixed signals since day one. Tell me to stop flirting with you and I will.”_

_“Tell me.”_

_Raelle shook her head, muttering unintelligibly under her breath._

_“What?”_

_Raelle surged forward and closed the gap between them, her lips burning as they reached Scylla’s._

_This was a terrible idea, but it felt incredibly right. Raelle just wanted to feel right for a little bit after a week of feeling wrong at every turn._

_She grappled with the zipper on Scylla’s dress as she walked them steadily until Scylla’s back met the wall._

_“This doesn’t mean anything,” Raelle pulled back to say._

_She felt Scylla chuckle in reply so she stopped and looked back up to meet her eyes._

_“No, really. It means nothing.”_

_Scylla raised an eyebrow at her before shifting her weight and spinning them until Raelle was the one with her back against the wall. The sudden action caused her to let out a puff of breath. Her heart racing in her chest._

_She felt a coil of warm heat rising deep within her belly._

_“You gonna fuck me, or what?” She asked and Scylla smirked before lifting the blonde so she could wrap her legs around her waist. She hiked the material of the gown up, cool air rushing and causing goosebumps to form on Raelle’s skin._

_Scylla’s fingers quickly found the scrap of lace fabric Raelle was wearing. She gave a sharp tug and the sound of fabric ripping filled the air._

_“You’re paying for those.”_

_“Sure,” Scylla said before plunging a finger into Raelle’s wetness and lifting it up to her mouth. She hummed at the taste. “Still not feeling anything?”_

_Raelle rolled her eyes and lifted her hips trying to search for any sort of relief._

_“Would you shut –” her words were cut off as Scylla’s fingers trailed back and began to tease the sensitive skin at the top of her folds._

_“I thought you didn’t want to talk?”_

_Raelle groaned as Scylla brought a probing finger delicately inside while bringing her lips to the side of her neck._

_“Move,” she growled. Raelle felt a trace of smile against her skin before the Spree agent stared to move, her hips canting in time with the wrist. The blonde cried out, head slamming into the wall behind her as the fingers fell into a frantic._

_It felt good. Very good. Scylla had to know that._

_Scylla brought her free hand up to cover Raelle’s mouth._

_“You don’t want everyone out there to hear, do you?”_

_Raelle was reminded of the large collection of people just outside the door._

_She shook her head and Scylla continued her unrelenting pace. Perspiration began to form on Raelle’s brow as she quickly climbed closer and closer to her peak._

_She ground her hips down harder against Scylla and let out a low moan when she found contact with Scylla’s pubic bone. She continued the pattern, grinding down on every one of Scylla’s upstrokes until she finally felt her eyes roll back into her head._

_“Shit,” she breathed, prolonging the word in her mouth._

_The world spun slowly back into focus and Raelle heard the sound of the front door opening._

_She dropped her feet back to the ground in a hurry. Her legs wobbled. She quickly straightened her dress back down and went to fix her hair and looked as presentable as she could when she had just been brought to orgasm against the wall of a strangers’ home._

_She felt a small bit of relief when it was Byron’s face that appeared and not that of one of the homeowners or Tally or Abigail. It wasn’t like he didn’t already know about them._

_“Was wondering where you two ran off to,” he said, a teasing lilt to his voice that told Raelle he knew exactly what they had been getting up to. “Tally and Abigail were looking to walk back with you Rae.”_

_“Oh, yeah,” Raelle said quickly, moving towards the door without so much as another glance over her shoulder at either Spree agent._

_As she stepped out, she was met with Tally and Abigail leaning against the wall, each with their shoes in their hands._

_“Back to Fort Salem?” Raelle asked and began to lead the way without preamble._

_“Collar,” Abigail said after a moment._

_“Yeah?”_

_“That’s a nice shade of lipstick you’ve got on your neck. Looks an awful lot like the color Ramshorn was wearing tonight, doesn’t it, Tal?”_

_The blonde flushed, picking up the pace a little._

_Whatever, she thought. If the Tarim, who wouldn't even come into the village for medical treatment because it went against their beliefs, could make an exception for Beltane, so could she._

_It didn't have to mean anything. She did her best to ignore the tiny voice in her head telling her how much of a lie it was._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey all. So sorry for the delay, but last week was probably the least productive week of my life. Nothing like crippling anxiety over the country’s future compounded with soaring COVID numbers. It’s been a very tough couple of weeks, but I am hopeful that the new administration is actually going to listen to science even if we are in deep the way it is now. Anyways, all you Americans, hope you were able to vote and get your voice heard. A historic election, for sure (we have a black, Asian, female VP!!!).
> 
> Now then, please let me know your thoughts on this long-awaited chapter! Would love to hear favorite parts, predictions, and whatever else you’d like to offer. 
> 
> I can’t make any promises about the next update timing considering the COVID surge as I mentioned above very much affecting my work schedule. Thank you for your patience! Writing is a big stress reliever for me and reading your feedback makes my days a little brighter, which, in 2020, means a hell of a lot.


	15. Of trauma and pretending

Chapter 15

Soft snores disturbed the otherwise tranquility of the medical tent.

 _Fucking Jameson,_ Raelle Collar cursed.

She gave it only a halfhearted attempt under her breath while slightly adjusting to continue staring up at the tent’s monochromatic ceiling. She had been trying her very best to not acknowledge the fact that her last time on base had been highlighted by an explosive device planted by a terrorist organization, but that was a bit easier said than done when it came down to it.

This tent was, for all intents and purposes, the medical building until they were able to rebuild. It still had the appearance of a house someone hadn’t fully moved into.

There were stacks of crates that had yet to be unloaded, supplies were stacked in boxes in separate areas of the tent. There were no operating tables here, only collapsible tables that stood at a single height near the triage area at the front of the tent. They hadn’t had the chance to put up all of the dividers next.

It was a field hospital in flux.

Most of the victims that had survived had been airlifted out that same night. There hadn’t been that many survivors.

A small lantern rest on the ground between Raelle and Jameson. Its small flame danced to the fullness of its short stature and cast shadows upon Jameson’s form in his own cot.

She apparently wasn’t allowed to sleep anywhere without a babysitter that was skilled in advanced life support. Have one brush with death and suddenly everyone is treating you with kid gloves.

She had pleaded her case to a less than impressed Anacostia who clearly was only entertaining the discussion because of said accident. So, she was relegated to the medical tent overnight since Tally and Abigail were on “leave” and she couldn’t sleep in her own room.

She, admittedly, had been a little shocked when it was Jameson who appeared to take the overnight with her. He had grunted out that he was on call anyways before collapsing onto the cot beside her and promptly falling asleep with a deftness only a surgeon could possess.

She was beginning to regret her decision to make the move. She knew it was less of a strain on the army’s resources for her to be here. They didn’t need to send anyone over from the base to check on her when she was here.

It had, of course, been an affair for her to be moved. She couldn’t exactly hop into the front seat of one the Spree jeeps and be dropped off. She argued but finally accepted when they made her take a stretcher transport over instead.

It hadn’t made sense for her to stay there any longer. Not with most of the Spree out on that half-assed mission with Tally and Abigail in tow.

To say the cot she was currently laying on left some things to be desired would be putting it lightly.

 _Good, old military-grade supplies_ , she thought sullenly, wiggling again and wincing as the pain shot up again.

She had never been more aware of all the nerve endings in her body than she had been since she the bombing. The meds they offered numbed her to their constant cries for attention, but they also numbed her from everything else.

Shouldn’t she be glad to be feeling the pain? Didn’t the pain mean she was alive? Against all odds, alive?

She had started to underreport her pain today, realizing this was the only way she would start getting smaller doses of the medications that knocked her flat out every time she took them.

When she did wake, it was almost as if she weren’t truly there anyways. She hated the fog they left behind. She hated feeling so useless while her friends were out on an op, no matter how half-brained the planning had been, with the Spree.

The problem with recovering from a major illness or injury was that your days and nights so easily blended together. Everyone kept harping on Raelle about resting and healing as if she hadn’t gone to med school and learned all about the healing process.

Doctors really were the worst patients.

When she wasn’t irritated at people treating her like she was made of glass, she slipped into anxious circles instead.

She worried about Tally. She worried about Abi. Worried they would be injured and end up in the bed right next to her.

Or worse, end up in a coffin to be flown home with a flag over it.

She worried about her dad, who they hadn’t been able to get a hold of that day because the comms on the base were still being repaired and they were forced to use hand held radios instead. She worried that he had seen the news that was no doubt plastered all over the stations of the bombing. She worried what he would do if he had already come to terms with her being one of the victims.

She tried rather desperately to not worry or even spare a thought to a certain Spree agent.

That was a tad easier said than done.

She spent half the time projecting angry thoughts about how Scylla could go and get herself shot for all the blonde cared and the other half staunchly defending the thought against a rather stubborn little voice in her head that would always seem to come out and remind her how it was a lie.

If Scylla went and got herself shot, Raelle would care. She would care entirely too much.

That was part of the problem.

She sighed, wincing slightly as a sharp pain radiated from her ribs where the chest tube had been.

She was a much bigger fan of putting in chest tubes than being the person receiving them.

A flicker of light and voices outside of the tent pulled her from her thoughts. She shifted in bed again, trying to prop herself up more so she could see where they were walking. Their lights grew dim as they walked in the direction of the gate.

Probably just the night guard switching out.

She hadn’t been able to bring her body down from the high alert it had been on since that night. She was exhausted, yet, still jumped at the slightest sound of something happening.

 _Like some private straight out of basic,_ her inner dialogue reprimanded.

She knew better than to accept that line of thought.

It was PTSD.

She knew that. Had seen it and diagnosed it in dozens of soldiers in the past.

It was her body’s natural response to the trauma of that night.

She knew it would take hours of therapy and possibly medications to get on the other side of it and wasn’t particularly looking forward to that part of her recovery even if she knew it was for the best.

She couldn’t remain at this level of alertness for the rest of her life. She would crash and burn, had seen it in some of the best soldiers she had known over the years.

Jameson stopped snoring for a second and Raelle thought that maybe goddess was looking out for her only for him to start right back in after the brief pause.

Well, at least Raelle could diagnose him with sleep apnea. That was about as close to being a doctor as she was going to get for foreseeable future.

She had been lucky not to have broken any of her upper extremities. If she played her cards right, she could talk them into letting her operate sitting down until her leg healed.

The thing was, Raelle couldn’t sit up without tiring right now let alone fathom maintaining posture to operate for hours on end.

She was bitter, she realized with the tiniest bit of disdain.

_Do I even have the right to be bitter about anything when I shouldn’t even be alive?_

_Lucky_.

That was the word everyone had used when she returned miraculously alive.

She sure didn’t feel lucky.

Lucky would’ve been not being in that medical building during the bombing.

Lucky would’ve been remaining safe in her bed with Tally and Abigail sleeping in their own beds in the room beside her.

Lucky would’ve been if there had been no bombing at all, if there had been no Camarilla ever.

She knew at least part, an unvoiced part as most things with him were, of Jameson sleeping beside her right now was the guilt he felt at having switched shifts that night.

She didn’t blame him, couldn’t blame him really. He had a wife and kids and people that counted on him, and Raelle? She had Tally and Abigail and her dad waiting for her back home. Not much beyond that.

She was glad it been her and not him in that OR. Dr. L’Amara wouldn’t have been scrubbed in if it were his case, meaning she might have been in the triage room all the closer to the blast zone.

She wanted to be grateful for Jameson saving her life. She did.

It was just that her best friends were out hunting down the Camarilla and she was stuck here, listening to Jameson snoring and periodically become apneic.

Raelle Collar had never been all that good at sitting back.

She never really had much of a choice when she was younger. First, it had been soccer and lacrosse filling her schedule and then keeping food on their table.

She had never gotten the chance to sit back and relax.

A part of her was thankful for that in a way.

Being left alone to dwell on her thoughts never panned out the way she hoped it would.

A sharp crack of static startled Raelle from her thoughts.

_“Front gate to med tent, over.”_

Jameson fumbled on the ground between their cots, knocking the radio to the ground with a clatter.

 _“Front gate to med tent, over.”_ Impatience dripped on the dry delivery.

“Yeah, yeah, yeah, I’m coming,” Jameson grumbled as he finally grasped onto the radio and pressed the side button to communicate. “Med tent, here, over.”

_“We’ve got Spree at the gate in need of medical attention. Do you want us to send them in? Over.”_

Raelle’s eyes shot to Jameson as her heart started to race.

Jameson ignored her look of concern, “Would you prefer to let them bleed out at the gate? Send them in, over.” He smashed the radio onto the cot, reaching for his boots and muttering under his breath, “Fucking idiots. Like they don’t know what side we’re on.”

With great effort, Raelle swung her legs to the side of her cot. Her splinted left lower leg hovered above the ground as her right foot rooted down into the earth. She panted slightly from the exertion of the movement.

“Where the fuck do you think you’re going?” Jameson asked, no vitriol in his words as he finished lacing his boots.

Raelle shrugged, regretting the movement as her right shoulder cried out in protest.

She had already weaned herself out of the sling, but it was sore. The muscles would still spasm at times as if they were checking to make sure the bone was still in place.

Jameson was tossing on a scrub top when he let out a low breath, clearly warring with himself a bit before he pushed the wheelchair over to her and grasped under her arms to help her transfer to the seat.

He was surprisingly gentle as he moved the left leg up and locked it in place, grabbing for her pillow and using it to prop the leg up.

The wheelchair that was waiting for her when she got on base was a welcome addition. She hoped that her shoulder and side would be stable enough for her to use crutches soon. Until then, two wheels would have to do.

He gave her good leg a gentle pat, “Come on then, Dr. Collar, I could use another set of eyes. Make sure none of the medics fuck up my patients.”

Raelle smiled gratefully as he wheeled her over to the triage beds and slipped her chair out of the way, kicking on her brakes with a wink.

She was sure that L’Amara would give Jameson a scolding tomorrow for this, but her curiosity and her anxiety needed this.

_Who was going to be wheeled in from the Spree?_

Jameson slapped on a pair of gloves, opening a kit and putting on a headlamp. He tied an iso gown around his neck and clapped, suppressing a yawn as the motion outside the tent approached.

_Would it be Tally?_

Raelle shuddered at the thought of the redhead bleeding on that table.

_Abigail?_

She would sooner bleed out in the field than bring dishonor to the Bellweather name by being injured on an unsanctioned mission when she was meant to be on leave in Germany.

Byron’s smiling face flickered across her mind and she cursed them all for even considering going on such a dangerous op in the first place.

 _It wouldn’t be her,_ Raelle told herself, refusing to give the thought any breathing room. _It won’t be her. It just won’t,_ she tried to convince herself.

The tent flaps opened and Byron was the first one through, holding the flap open as four people, two of which were wearing balaclavas, carried a body between them.

 _Not Byron,_ Raelle thought in relief as the man moved to help his colleagues with the sheet they were using to carry the patient.

“Over here,” Jameson gruffed out, hardly looking up as the group shuffled to the cot and eased the patient into place. “Someone want to tell what the hell happened or is everyone just gonna let me figure it out on my own?”

Raelle adjusted in her chair trying to see over the table’s edge. Her eyes swept from top to bottom, noting the tall stature and wide-set shoulders. On the face, a beard.

She let out a breath.

_Not Tally or Abigail._

Another breath.

_Not her._

Raelle’s eyes moved quickly to triage the other individuals in the tent.

It was as though her eye had a mind of its own as it was pulled seemingly of its own accord toward the slight figure on the end.

_Scylla._

She was standing, well leaning, over the table as Jameson began his exam from top to bottom.

“Well?” Jameson repeated and Scylla began to speak rapidly.

_GSW… arterial… bullet removed…_

She wasn’t catching much of what was being said because Scylla was covered in blood.

Raelle’s eye narrowed as she tried to see where the bleeding was coming from.

Her face was streaked with blood, hands dripping with it.

_Had she been shot too?_

“Dr. Collar,” a voice cut into her thoughts and she turned to see Byron with a weak smile on his face.

She raised her one good eyebrow at him in greeting, gaze drifting back to the mystery in front of her.

Byron stooped until he was right beside her ear and spoke softly, “Not. Her. Blood.”

He then straightened back up and began to walk back to the other side of the table.

Scylla’s eyes flashed over to Raelle in the corner as though she had just noticed her for the first time.

Their gaze locked.

Raelle recognized the heaviness in her eyes. The man on the table was her team, he was hers to lead. She had led him to this fate.

She felt a wave of sympathy rush over her only to be swept away as she forced her eyes back to the other figures.

Medics streamed into the tent now arriving from the barracks to help Jameson.

 _For fuck’s sake,_ Raelle thought as she now recognized the forms of the two masked people who had helped carry the man in.

“Hey,” she called out, careful to modulate her voice so as to not draw the attention of any of the medical team at the table. “Tweedle-dee and tweedle-dumbass.”

Both heads flipped towards her.

 _Idiots,_ Raelle shook her head incredulously and gestured behind her.

She carefully rolled her chair back to give the medical team room to work as her two best friends walked warily towards her looking very much like children with their hands caught in the proverbial cookie jar.

“Do you two know the definition of low profile?” she drawled. “Because this isn’t it.”

Abigail rolled her eyes, but said nothing.

“Do y’all really think those masks are enough for people to not realize there are suddenly triple the number of female Spree operatives?”

“Would you rather we let him lose his arm in the field?” Abigail replied sharply, “Because that was the alternative.”

“I’d rather you not go out there and almost get yourselves killed, but apparently that’s a little much to ask.”

“Collar.”

“Bellweather.”

“You know very well if you weren’t stuck in that chair you’d be right beside us.”

Raelle guffawed, incredulous, “And follow orders from her?”

The two looked over their shoulders to where Scylla was watching the medical team and hardly blinking. Beneath the blood, she looked pale.

“She’s actually a pretty good leader.” Tally said cautiously after a moment.

“You should’ve seen her in action,” Abigail said, adopting the same thoughtful tone as Tally before adding, “I’m not saying I completely understand the appeal, but there’s something to it.”

The surgeon ignored the last comment. “She’s Spree.”

Abigail blinked. “Yes, and so is Byron. The Spree are good at what they do, Collar.”

“At what cost,” Raelle muttered, too quiet for either woman to hear her.

Her eyes flickered back to Scylla. Byron had steered her by the shoulders away from the table. The two appeared to be having some sort of conversation with gestures alone.

“You two should get out of here. You’ve already been here too long,” Raelle spoke, louder this time. They nodded, Abigail adjusting the slit on her balaclava so more of her face was covered. “I’ll kill you both if you’re the next ones brought in to be on that table.”

“Lovely sentiment, shitbird,” Abigail laughed out, lighter.

Tally stepped forward and rest a heavy hand on Raelle’s good shoulder.

“We’ll be back soon, Rae.” There was finality to her words. Abigail nodded beside her.

“Come back in one piece,” she told them and then they both made their way back out the tent, heads bowed down.

Byron and the other Spree agent followed them out leaving only one Spree member standing.

Scylla drifted slowly over to her, eyes still firmly on the table and the man on it.

“Keep an eye on him for me?” She asked, a sad smile on her lips, not looking at her.

“’Course,” Raelle rasped out.

The brunette gave a shake of her head, clearly wanting to say something more and talking herself out of it before beginning to turn towards the exit. “Scylla?”

She swung back to face Raelle, one corner of her lips turned down. “Keep them safe,” she nodded in the direction that Byron, Tally, and Abigail had just left.

Scylla breathed in and nodded, turning towards the exit once again.

The words Raelle had left unsaid floated in the air between them as she walked off.

**_You_ ** _stay safe._

Scylla paused, looking over her shoulder one last time at Raelle before exiting the tent and Raelle half believed she might have heard them.

*****

_Raelle Collar startled awake. She blinked her eyes heavily as the darkness around her came into focus._

_Fuck._

_Shit._

_Damn it, Collar, she admonished herself, swinging her bare legs over the edge of the bed and reaching sightlessly for her clothes._

_A figure stirred in the bed beside her and Raelle froze. She turned slowly to where Scylla was sprawled seemingly without a care against the sheets underneath her. She was asleep._

_Raelle wasn’t supposed to fall asleep. She had made a point to never fall asleep._

_Actually, in all fairness, she had made a point to not make a point of any of this._

_Because making a point of any of this would acknowledge the fact that it kept happening despite Raelle’s resolutions after each occasion to never let it happen again._

_Yet here she was, in Scylla and Byron’s room in the Spree facility where Byron had suspiciously been making himself sparse almost every night for the past week._

_They didn’t talk about it. Not tonight. Not any of the other nights really._

_They met, they fucked, Raelle left before falling asleep._

_That was it._

_Until today._

_She had been on call the night before._

_It wasn’t exactly part of her schedule but when Dr. L’Amara said there was an open shift, Raelle leapt at the chance even though she hadn’t gotten any time to sleep the day before._

_Tally and Abigail had been shifty since Beltane. She wasn’t about to keep pushing her luck by purposely spending time with them._

_It was surprising to her, when she thought about it, Abigail hadn’t cornered her once about Beltane yet. She was being uncharacteristically unobtrusive which only served to make Raelle more anxious, like Abigail were a mischievous child finally acting good for once._

_It seemed too good to be true._

_Tally was smiling at her a lot more than usual, but that could’ve been for any number of reasons._

_Tally was unapologetically one of the most optimistic people Raelle had ever met. For all Raelle knew, she could’ve been excited about a new love interest of her own or even her mom shipping her more ramen._

_She didn’t want to come off paranoid to assume it was because of something to do with her. She wasn’t nearly that egocentric._

_So, she picked up the overnight call shift and, rather than spending the night warm in her own bed, waiting to be called in, she spent it in the medical building putting away supplies that had been dropped off earlier that week and cleaning out the fridge and freezer there that clearly no human being had thought about touching in years if the mold on some of the food in there was anything to go off._

_It felt good to stay busy._

_When she was busy, she didn’t think which probably should have been more of a red flag when it came down to it since not thinking was what had gotten her into this mess in the first place._

_No matter which way you looked at it, Raelle hadn’t gotten any sleep the night before and when the day team arrived to find a sparkling clean fridge and freezer and fully restocked medical building she signed off._

_Her feet seemed to have a mind of their own as they traveled to the gate instead of back to the barracks._

_One after the other, she stepped steadily in a direction she refused to admit before she approached it._

_“Dr. Collar,” Byron had greeted her near the side gate of the Spree facility when she approached it. She gave him a tired nod and he took pity on her, ushering her through the side gate and into the part of the facility where the Spree living quarters had been fashioned._

_He knocked gently on the doorframe, the grin evident in his voice as he called out in Arabic and said something Raelle didn’t understand._

_Scylla jumped to attention from where she had been seated on the edge of her bed and carefully pushed Byron out the door, closing it behind him._

_“Hey,” she greeted after a moment. “What are you doing –"_

_Raelle found herself moved then to connect their lips, swallowing the greeting whole._

_It progressed from there._

_As it seemed to more often lately than Raelle would care to admit. Raelle told herself it was because Scylla was as talented at other things as she was at kissing and that’s all there was to it._

_They weren’t dating so she wasn’t breaking any of her rules._

_Scylla, for her part, had been taking all of her cues from Raelle and as such seemed to be on the same page that they were not to acknowledge what was happening behind closed doors… and in closets and in the back of a Spree jeep and in that alley that one time…_

_She digressed._

_Raelle shook her head, gathering her thoughts back into focus as she buttoned her uniform top._

_She hadn’t meant to stay._

_It was Scylla tenatively suggesting she stay while she had to make a run with the Spree._

_The door will be locked, she had said, only Byron and I have a key._

_Raelle was well aware Byron knew the most details about the not dating she and Scylla had been doing. She still wasn’t particularly interested in having him walk in while she slept sans clothes in Scylla’s bed._

_Scylla had laughed and told her that a naked woman was probably the best way to keep Byron out of a room._

_Raelle told herself she was too tired and that’s why she stayed. She told herself it had nothing to do with Scylla’s shampoo lingering on the pillow she rest her head on. That she had been tired and needed sleep and any bed would do._

_She told herself that it made more sense for her to stay here instead of going back to the barracks where most people, including her roommates, would be noisily getting ready for the day. She told herself Scylla and Byron had their own ensuite bathroom and she could take a shower without flip flops on, a luxury you never realize until you’re months into your first deployment, toes sticking to cheap plastic._

_It was when Scylla returned some hours later with lunch that was quickly forgotten that Raelle pressed pause on telling herself anything as she and Scylla did more of the not talking they had gotten so good at over the past few weeks._

_She had never been all that great at switching back to nights from days. The opposite had always been much easier for her. She didn’t have a chance to fight the sleep that came after and now she had woken up with the sun already set._

_She had to get back to the gates before night shift came on otherwise there wasn’t a chance Anacostia wouldn’t hear about it as her commanding officer._

_She picked up her boots, padding across the floor softly in her socks to the door and carefully opened it. She stole a peek back over her shoulder where Scylla lay, face buried in the pillow Raelle had just vacated._

_She could end this anytime she needed to._

_Raelle Collar had been telling herself a lot of things in the past two and a half weeks. She was beginning to wonder if she would ever believe any of it._

_She slipped her boots on and carefully crept out the side entrance and gate of the Spree facility, getting only a cursory nod from the broad-shouldered man manning the gate._

_Her pace was fast, but measured and she made it to Fort Salem just before the night guards came on. Anacostia wouldn’t be alerted she had missed curfew, a small grace._

_She only hoped that Tally and Abi would already be asleep when she got back to their room. She opened the door to their room and the lights were blessedly off._

_Of course, she had never been all that lucky._

_As she began to peel one boot off as quietly as possible while making her way to her bed, she was blinded as the light flicked on._

_“Well, well, well,” Abigail’s voice commanded from over near the light switch and Raelle paused, cringing, “Look what the cat dragged in. Third time this week, isn’t it, Tal?”_

_Raelle straightened to full height to meet the downright giddy appearances of her best friends who apparently had been waiting in the dark for just this moment._

_Tally was beaming and nearly vibrating in place. Abigail looked smug._

_Well, smugger than usual._

_“What are you talking about?” Raelle asked dismissively and threw herself onto her bed._

_“Court is now in session,” Abigail sounded off, tapping her open fist on the wood in front of her. Raelle rolled her eyes, knowing full well wherever this was going would not be good for her. “Your honor, may I present the evidence?”_

_“Proceed, counselor,” Tally said, mock seriousness in her voice._

_What did they, rehearse this?_

_“My first piece of evidence is quite damning. The defendant, who is known by most to be a bit of a grump at baseline, has been spotted by several eyewitnesses skipping to breakfast on more than one occasion. One character witness even heard whistling,” Abigail raised a finger when Raelle opened her mouth to speak and Raelle raised a not so kind finger back in response. “Next, the defendant has been disappearing and reappearing slightly more disheveled regularly.”_

_“Are you done?” Raelle asked, hoping for nonchalance, although she was certain her tone was washed with mostly irritation._

_Abigail smirked at her, “And last, your honor, is exhibit A,” she strode across the room and brandished her pointer finger towards the surgeon’s neck. “A massive hickey that is definitely fresh.”_

_Raelle’s hand shot to her neck instinctively and Abigail looked like Christmas had come early._

_Raelle rubbed at the mildly sore spot on her neck with a frown on her face. She would have to get Scylla back for that._

_“Ah-ha! Ladies and gentleman of the jury, your honor, I rest my case.” Tally gave a small bit of applause at the dramatic finish, allowing Abigail to slip out of character. “Just admit it, shitbird, you and Ramshorn finally stopped playing the will they, won’t they and are firmly onto the where should they stage.”_

_Raelle dropped her hand. “I don’t think I should talk to you without my lawyer present.”_

_Tally plopped next to her, bouncing slightly. “Come on, Rae, let us live vicariously through you. Share the romance. Please?” She stuck out her bottom lip, pouting, as she made her eyes big._

_It was always a task to try to say no to that puppy dog face. She was the only soldier in basic that got extra helpings of peach cobbler._

_She really didn’t have any ground to stand on to keep denying this._

_“There’s no romance,” Raelle said instead._

_Abigail sat down on her other side, clearly shocked at how quickly they got information out of her._

_“I don’t know. She’s a mercenary, you’re in the army,” Tally said in a dreamy voice, “Kind of a star-crossed lovers’ trope, isn’t it, Abi?”_

_“No,” Raelle nearly shouted, perhaps more to herself than the others. Her patience was wearing thin. She rose to her feet, turning to the two. “There is no romance. It’s not like that. It’s… we’re just fucking.”_

_They both looked unconvinced. Abigail raised an eyebrow that practically asked her question for her._

_You sure about that? It communicated._

_Dead certain, Raelle tried to communicate back with a glare._

_“You seem to be seeing each other an awful lot if you’re just fucking,” Abigail drawled._

_“If you guys got married do you think you’d take her name?” Tally pondered out loud._

_Raelle rolled her eyes._

_“Or maybe they’d hyphenate. What would sound better, Tal, Collar-Ramshorn or Ramshorn-Collar?” Abigail joined in._

_Raelle felt her frustration beginning to bubble over._

_“Y’all,” she tried, but they barreled on._

_“I feel like Ramshorn-Collar sounds classier, somehow?”_

_“We could always abbreviate it too, like –"_

_“Listen—”_

_“Is classy really what we’re looking for, though?”_

_“Stop!” Raelle bellowed, leaping to her feet and spinning to face them. It was dramatic, but it worked. They both stopped talking. “I don’t know how else to explain it to you. We aren’t dating, there’s no romance. None!” She waved her arms in front of her. “Just fucking!”_

_There was a knock on the doorframe and Raelle froze._

_Not exactly a part of the conversation she wanted anyone walking in on._

_As long as it was just another member of their unit and not…_

_“Everything okay in here, Collar?”_

_Of fucking course. Of course, it had to be Anacostia._

_She seemed to have a knack for showing up at Raelle’s most embarrassing moments._

_Raelle felt color drain from her cheeks, hands dropping to her sides, but refusing to turn around. “Yes, staff sergeant. We were just…” Her eyes shot to Abigail and Tally who were looking on with barely contained mirth. Freaking useless, the both of them, “Talking?”_

_“Was that a question or an answer, Dr. Collar?”_

_Raelle cringed before reluctantly spinning to face her._

_“An answer?” Raelle said, her voice pitching upwards of its own accord._

_She could hear Abigail snickering into her hand from where she was on the bed._

_Anacostia shook her head, “Dr. L’Amara would like a word with you.”_

_“Right,” Raelle said, quickly slipping her boots back on and rebuttoning the front of her uniform. She followed Anacostia out of the barracks, her staff sergeant turning to her for a moment and pulling the overturned collar on her uniform top right-side out._

_“You should probably tell Ramshorn to not put the marks in places that can’t be easily covered.”_

_Raelle’s jaw fell open, her eyes widening._

_Anacostia smirked, giving her shoulders and pat and gently spinning her to face the medical building in the distance. “Have a good night, Collar.”_

_Raelle took shaky steps toward the medical building, stunned into silence once again._

_Well, fuck._

_Raelle knew that hookup in the closet by the cafeteria had been too risky, but Scylla had said she could be quiet. Goddess knew that was a lie not unlike the ones she had been telling herself lately._

_“Dr. Collar,” Dr. L’Amara greeted. “I won’t keep you long, I know you were on call last night. I just wanted to check in to see if you were interested in joining a medical team returning to the Tarim this weekend.”_

_Raelle was still mildly reeling from Anacostia’s comment and her mind scrambled to catch up._

_“The Tarim?”_

_“Yes, Collar. I would never presume to understand the depths of what you’ve been through, but I thought you deserved the chance to decide for yourself.” She took a step closer, her voice lowering, “No one would think any less of you if you sat this one out, especially after what happened last time.”_

_It was an out. She was being given an out._

_“The Spree?” The question fell from her lips._

_“Will be acting as interpreters again. We will be sending our own security this time.”_

_She had the brief thought of shock that Scylla had failed to mention this to her. Then again, they hadn’t been talking all that much when they were together._

_“Collar? I can give you time to think about it.”_

_“No need,” Raelle replied firmly, “I’d like to go.”_

_Dr. L’Amara gave her a searching look before nodding. “Go get some sleep, Collar.”_

_Raelle gave a smile and a nod before saying her goodbyes and slowly making her way back towards the barracks._

_She was going back to the Tarim. With the Spree. To share a tent with the woman she had been deliberately avoiding having any real conversations with since their last op together. What’s the worst that could happen?_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welcome back! Thanks so much for all of your patience. The last month has been a lot. I’m still in the thick of things, but thankfully have my vaccine (light at the end of the tunnel) scheduled and can finally see some hope in all of this. Hoping that all of you can hold your loved ones a little closer for all the folks that can’t this season. Not sure what my updating schedule will be, but I’ll keep trying.
> 
> If you feel up for it, I’d love to know what you think. Any thoughts on the chapter, the new developments, the double dose of Raelle POV?? Kudos and comments make my world go round.
> 
> Wishing all of you a happy and restful holiday season no matter how you celebrate. Consider this my gift to you all!


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